KTM ace Acosta after a frustrating Saturday at Assen: Little track time, too many mistakes

Pedro Acosta had a Saturday to forget at Assen. A technical fault in FP2 was followed by another in Q2. The result for the Spaniard was a lack of preparation and eighth place on the grid. After the sprint race, the KTM rider was clearly still reeling from how Saturday had gone: “It causes a lot of problems if you’re not ready for the race.” One new development for which Acosta was less prepared than his rivals was starting the bike without a launch control device on the front fork: this marked his first MotoGP start without the ‘Hole-Shot Device’ on the front fork. Not a positive change for the Munderfinger team’s current frontrunner: “I think without the device, the start is even more dangerous than before, because the bike is much more prone to wheelies. That’s something worth reconsidering.”

The start was followed by the loss of eighth place to Fabio Quartararo. After just a few hundred metres, the rider from Murcia skidded through the gravel trap and lost a further six places – he had misjudged the entry to a corner. For the 2023 Moto2 World Champion, this was the logical consequence of not having had enough time on the bike to get used to the conditions: “If you can only manage a total of six timed laps in FP2 and qualifying, there’s hardly any chance to prepare properly, and mistakes like mine happen.”

Subsequently, the rider with number 37 managed to pull off six more overtakes and crossed the finish line in ninth place. It was cold comfort for the rider, now fifth in the World Championship standings, as he said: “We’re a long way from where we want to be on this track.” The 22-year-old had finished Saturday’s sprint in ninth place, one place lower than his starting position.

This was partly due to technical issues that had prevented him from getting in more track time beforehand. These hadn’t occurred before, as Acosta noted: “Another surprise. This sort of fault was new. The team needs to keep an eye on this – and then keep their fingers crossed that we make it to the finish in Sunday’s long race.” More preparation is needed for the GP, according to Acosta: “We’re running late! We only have the warm-up left to get ready for Sunday’s race.” However, the Spaniard isn’t expecting an apology from the team: “That won’t do us any good. What we need is for the problem to be fixed and not to happen again!”

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MotoGP World Championship

28.08.2026 - 08:55

Willkommen zum Rennwochenende in Assen

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Fans

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Paddock

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Jorge Martin

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Fabio di Giannantonio

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Luca Marini

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Toprak Razgatlioglu

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Pedro Acosta & Brad Binder

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Enea Bastianini

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Der Start des Sprints

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Fabio Quartararo

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Ai Ogura

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Joan Mir

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Joan Mir

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Pedro Acosta

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Fans

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Diogo Moreira

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Cal Crutchlow

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Luca Marini

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Francesco Bagnaia

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Marc Márquez

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Alex Márquez

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Alex Rins

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Marco Bezzecchi

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Raúl Fernández

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Marc Márquez

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Maverick Viñales

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Jorge Martin

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Qualifying - Ai Ogura, Jorge Martin & Marco Bezzecchi

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Sprint - Ai Ogura, Raúl Fernández & Fabio di Giannantonio

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Willkommen zum Rennwochenende in Assen

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