Aleix Espargaró rode his Aprilia RS-GP to a sixth-place finish in the Portuguese GP, held on the Portimão track, keeping the gaps to a minimum: just over 8 seconds behind the winner and less than 4 from the podium.
It is a nice result that represents his third top-ten finish in the first three races. Never before had Aleix started a championship this well with Aprilia, so much that he is lying sixth in the overall standings. And the result could have been even better, but after a warm-up session where he had demonstrated a better pace than the one he had during the race, number 41 had to reckon with the highest heat of the weekend which conditioned the performance of the medium tyre chosen for the rear.
Aleix and Aprilia were put to the test after the good performance in Qatar and the RS-GP confirmed its status as an outstanding and growing project, while Aleix demonstrated great skill managing the race, in spite of the unexpected difficulties he had to face.
There is good news from the other side of the garage as well, confirming the improvements seen throughout the weekend and, thanks in part to a few crashes, Lorenzo Savadori earned his first championship points, finishing 14th.
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