Maverick Vinales looked set to hand KTM its first MotoGP podium of the 2025 season in Qatar – until a post-race tyre pressure penalty cruelly demoted him from second to 14th.

The Spaniard’s stunning ride for the Tech3 team was undone by a few critical laps spent under the minimum tyre pressure limit.

And according to team boss Herve Poncharal, the dramatic late-race pace of Marc Marquez might have made all the difference.

Poncharal explained that Vinales responded to a dashboard warning by opening the door for Marquez to pass, hoping to tuck in behind and raise his front tyre pressure.

“The problem for us was that Marc then pushed at his maximum and opened a gap,” Poncharal told Crash.net. 

“If Maverick could have been right on Marc’s exhaust, like Marc was with Alex at Buriram, maybe we could have been OK.”

The Frenchman added: “We have to accept the rule and it’s the same for everyone. So I will never shout and complain that it was unfair.

“But sentimentally, it’s so difficult to swallow.”

“The whole team is with him on the bike”

The back story to what looked like being KTM’s first podium of the season is well known.

After surviving Pierer Mobility’s winter financial woes, the RC16 project was plunged straight into a performance crisis due to vibration and grip issues.

With the long-term future of MotoGP project still unclear, every result counts, but KTM arrived in Qatar as the only brand without a top-five finish.

When Vinales, tenth after an ill-advised soft tyre choice in the Sprint race, bolted from sixth to third in the opening laps of the grand prix, the Tech3 team could barely believe their eyes.

“There is a huge effort that goes into a race weekend,” Poncharal said. “So when your rider is doing what Maverick was doing… The whole team is with him on the bike, following every sector of every lap.

“Then he crosses the finish line in P2, and the team explodes with joy and relief.”

The penalty, while technically fair, struck an emotional chord.

“Our rider has had one of the rides of his life. To demote him is right on the rule side, but very hard on the human side,” Poncharal added.

“We are not robots. This is a very high-level sport… Sometimes it might look a bit cold from the outside, but never forget the whole team has a real passion for this sport. We are at one with our rider on the bike.

“So it was almost a depression we were in after the penalty.”

 “Something I’ve never seen in my life”

“Normally, the rider is most affected by these kinds of things, and you have to try to cheer him up,” Poncharal continued.

“But Maverick, after everything, came back and told the team, ‘Hey guys, smile, we did it! Let’s celebrate.’

“The way Maverick behaved in that situation is something I’ve never seen in my life – and I’ve been here for almost half a century!

“Maverick has had so much bad luck in Texas and Qatar, but still, he was the one trying to lift the atmosphere. He behaved like a real star… And he proved he’s still got the same right wrist as when he was younger.

“I am very proud to have him with me, and I hope we can give him what he deserves. And after what happened on Sunday, my motivation, which was already high, is multiplied by ten.

“My mission is to give both riders – Maverick and Enea, nobody should forget about Enea – the support they deserve because we saw on Sunday what’s possible.

“This race was a big boost for all the KTM riders, to show them we can fight.”

Marquez, Bagnaia and Tardozzi praise KTM

A cool-down room video captured Marquez and Ducati Lenovo team-mate Francesco Bagnaia praising Vinales and KTM.

“It was really nice to hear Pecco and Marc amazed by what Maverick and the KTM were doing,” Poncharal said. “They mentioned the acceleration, the way the bike came out of corners. That’s a big boost for all KTM riders.

“We accept the penalty, but Maverick crossed the line in P2. We know the performance is there because [the low pressure] didn’t help us on track.

“There were also some nice words from Davide Tardozzi in parc ferme, who said to me: ‘Herve, fabulous! We need the opposition.’

“It’s important for the championship, and even the winning manufacturer, to have some competition and to be challenged.”

Can Vinales and KTM do it again?

The big question now is whether Vinales and KTM made a breakthrough or if the stars aligned perfectly in Qatar.

The next round at Jerez could prove pivotal.

“Even though the feeling in Texas and on Saturday in Qatar was good, we didn’t expect that,” Poncharal admitted.

“We know Maverick loves Texas. We know Maverick loves Qatar. We know the bike was good last year in Texas and Qatar last year. Jerez, Le Mans, Silverstone are very different circuits.

“So this is a big question mark for us also. Jerez especially is almost the opposite of the past two tracks. But if we can be fast there, it will be a very good signal. That’s what we need to see now.”

After KTM’s rocky start to the MotoGP season, Maverick Vinales stunned by fighting for victory in Qatar, leading five laps and crossing the line in second.

A cruel post-race tyre pressure penalty later saw him classified 14th, but that couldn’t mask a breakthrough performance.

Vinales, who hadn’t finished higher than tenth this season, charged from sixth to first, overtaking the likes of eventual winner Marc Marquez to lead at mid-race distance.

That potentially put him on course to become the first MotoGP rider to win with four different brands of bike: “I saw 0.7s [lead]. I said, ‘Come on, Maverick, you can do it!’

“But I also saw Marquez was a little bit controlling the rear and the front tyre.”

Vinales couldn’t contain Marquez when the world championship leader unleashed his full speed in the closing stages.

But he stayed within 1.8s of Marquez by the chequered flag and pulled almost three-seconds clear of the other factory Ducati of Francesco Bagnaia.

“I tried at the maximum,” Vinales said. “For me, it’s more than a victory. We need to be very happy. We fought against Ducati and showed our potential with the KTM. So, that’s great.

“Of course, I believe it that I can do it,” Vinales said of the turnaround. “Obviously it’s not easy. We are fighting against amazing riders. Marc and Pecco are very, very fast.

“However, we believe in our process. We believe in our project. We believe in our KTM.

“We did a great job. We started the year in a difficult way because still I didn’t feel really good with the bike.

“But step by step I’m getting there. I know really well my potential. I just need to stay calm, patient and give the maximum like I did today.”

What was the key in Qatar?

According to Vinales, it was a combination of adaptation, bike changes and finally banishing the KTM’s persistent chatter problems – at least for now.

“The vibrations today were a little bit less,” he explained. “Also I changed a little bit the way to enter in the corners, and force more the front than the rear.

“That helped me a lot to keep a good consistent pace through all the race because I could keep a lot of corner speed.

“Still there are points to improve. Obviously, we know that that vibration is the main key to maybe get closer to Marc and Pecco.

“But today we must be happy. The bike was in a really good level compared to the previous races.”

Nonetheless, the size of the step in Qatar had been a surprise.

“I expect that every weekend I’m doing a step ahead,” the former Suzuki, Yamaha and Aprilia MotoGP race winner said of his adaptation to the RC16.

“I didn’t expect to make this big a step, especially for the race, but we believe we can do it.”

24 hours earlier, Vinales had been among those to make an ill-fated gamble on the soft rear tyre in the Sprint race, leaving him in tenth place.

“Yesterday we made a mistake, but we must be happy that today we turned the cards around,” he said.

“With the medium tyre, I was feeling quite good all the race. The drop was not massive, so we could keep a really good rhythm.

“Still there are some limits, but there are some good points as well on the bike. So, it was good to fight in the front to really understand where we have to improve.

“It’s obvious that from yesterday to today I have less vibration, so I was able to push more,” he underlined.

The subsequent tyre-pressure penalty cost KTM its first podium of the season, promoting VR46’s Franco Morbidelli to third for another all-Ducati rostrum behind Marquez and Bagnaia.

Had Vinales seen a warning on his dashboard about possible low tyre pressure?

“I was just looking forward. I didn’t look at anything else. I didn’t have time. I was so concentrated,” he said.

“I don’t care what will happen. I’m happy with the result and the performance. This is something we needed. Really happy.”

“Maverick used a different bike”

The next-best KTM at the finish line was Pedro Acosta, over twelve seconds behind Vinales in ninth but also pleased to have avoided the vibrations.

Vinales’ Tech3 team-mate Enea Bastianini was eleventh with Acosta’s factory colleague Brad Binder left top salvage 13th after “one of the most difficult weekends of his career”.

All four KTMs were seen trying different parts on the rear of their bikes over the Lusail weekend, with Bastianini revealing:

“Maverick has been really fast today and has done a great job, incredible.

“Maverick used a different bike compared to the other three KTM riders. But, well at the moment, we can’t do this on my one.

“But I don’t want to take anything away from Maverick because today he has done a very good job.”

Bastianini declined to explain why he couldn’t have the same bike spec as Vinales in Qatar.

Fabio di Giannantonio at Valencia 2023, Fabio Quartararo at Jerez 2024 and now Maverick Vinales at Qatar 2025.

All have lost hard earned top-three finishes, after celebrating with their teams and receiving trophies on the rostrum, due to post-race MotoGP tyre penalties.

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While teams have got better at ‘guesstimating’ the pre-race pressures they will need since the punishments were introduced in mid-2023, sudden changes in weather or – as on Sunday – a rider performing a major upset cannot be factored into the calculations.

We don’t know, because it’s not revealed, how close Vinales got to meeting the required 60% of race laps above the minimum pressure.

But the five laps the Tech3 KTM rider spent in clean air at the front of the field could well have caused the penalty.

“Teams have to look into a crystal ball”

“It’s a nightmare, isn’t it? To have that dreaded message that flashes up at the end of a race saying rider is under investigation. There was a bit of hope because Acosta escaped a penalty last year due to a leaking rim. But no, he got the penalty,” MotoGP editor Pete McLaren told the Crash.net MotoGP podcast.

“The fresh air Vinales found himself in while he was leading was probably the problem. So if you do a much better race than anyone expects you end up being punished for it in terms of the tyre pressure.

“What could Tech3 do? They couldn’t really have imagined after the season that has had that he would be leading.

“The teams have to look into a crystal ball and come up with a starting tyre pressure. They don’t want to put it too high, because then their riders would have no chance in the race if they are behind another rider. But if they put it too low, and they are not following other riders, this is the kind of thing that cam happen.

“Presumably Maverick would have got a message on the dash saying – as we saw with Marc Marquez in Buriram – that he was in danger of not being above the 60% of race laps.

“That’s not a MotoGP system, each team has their own system. It’s up to the teams and the riders if they want to do that or not. But as Maverick said, he was just focused on looking ahead. He was racing for a win, incredibly, the last thing on his mind was looking at the dash.

“Just a real shame. We don’t know how much he was under, because it’s not revealed. And it brings us back to talk of should a rider be allowed an official warning, or joker, if they are very slightly under rather than a huge 16-second penalty which dropped him to 14th.

“Then of course Morbidelli was promoted to third, but missed out on the podium ceremony. It’s just a messy end to a race when you have these kind of penalties.”

Podcast host Jordan Moreland responded: “That’s what gets me. The one thing I don’t like is the fact that Maverick can go on the podium, and get his trophy. All the Tech 3 mechanics and the team are standing down there celebrating.

“But they know that there’s a penalty potentially coming. It just takes the absolute sting out of it, doesn’t it, Lewis?”

“It kills any hopes of seeing surprise results”

Senior Crash.net journalist Lewis Duncan: “It kills any hopes that we will ever have of seeing surprise results, under these current regulations. Because as Pete says, teams can’t set up to think ‘I might be leading for all these laps’.

“KTM had a terrible Saturday. Pedro Acosta said it was horrendous, Brad Binder said it was the worst race of his life. There was no hope in hell. Even Pit Beirer said, top five was realistic but none of our riders should be thinking about winning the Grand Prix this weekend.

“So, they’ve set it up to think, ‘we’re going to be in the pack, Maverick starts from sixth, he’s going to be there or thereabouts as far as a top five.

“Maverick rode brilliantly. That’s the reality of this. And for whatever reason the chatter issues that have been plaguing the KTM weren’t there. I think that the race pace being a bit slower than expected and using the medium tyre probably helped kind of mask things.

“But we then have a rider who has done really well, the team hasn’t been able to account for it and they get penalised for it.

“First of all, this regulation shouldn’t need to exist in the first place. Michelin should just have made a better front tyre.

“This was never really an issue before. OK there’s been more aerodynamics added over the past few years that has put more pressure on the front tyre. But they’ve had several years now to make a fix to that and they haven’t.

“We then had a new tyre that was tested for half an hour at the Misano test last year. And then they decided we can’t race it this year because we haven’t had enough testing time on it!”

“Penalties are not proportionate”

McLaren said: “It’s the worst-case scenario, changing a result after the chequered flag. There are always going to be some situations, some technical rules, where it’s unavoidable.

“But it does make you wonder with all the real-time information on the bikes now, could they modify the rule so that a cut-off point for tyre pressure is made halfway through a grand prix?

“Then they could potentially serve an in-race penalty, or receive an official warning from Race Direction that they will be penalised unless they can raise the pressure, by following someone, in the second half of the race.

“If nothing else the result could be known much sooner after the finish.

“At the moment it just feels like a rule that’s been designed by a committee. It’s a compromise that nobody seems completely happy with.

“If nothing else, I think a graded system of penalties would be better, depending on the size of the low pressure infringement.”

Duncan added: “We’ve seen with accidents and things like that, long laps have been handed out for the next event. Start doing that.

“The current 16-second penalty, 8 for a Sprint, is also not proportional. Say that was a crazy race, for whatever reason, with massive gaps, then Maverick wouldn’t have dropped as many places. Is that fair?

“We saw at Jerez in the Sprint race last year that Fabio Quartararo went from 3rd to 5th because it was such a weird race. Has someone that drops from 2nd to 10th for example, done something more severe than someone who only drops from 3rd to 5th because of the gaps?

“It’s not proportional. It doesn’t work. It’s something they can’t really control. So I think they need something that is a negative consequence for the next Grand Prix.”

McLaren concluded: “And just imagine, Zarco was only 0.173s behind Morbidelli in Qatar. If he’d held on to that fourth place, it would have been Zarco promoted to third by the Vinales penalty – but we would never have seen him on the podium.”

Tech3 KTM team manager Nicolas Goyon voiced his frustration after Maverick Vinales was stripped of a remarkable runner-up finish in Sunday’s Qatar MotoGP by a post-race tyre pressure penalty.

Vinales produced by far his best ride yet on the RC16, charging from sixth on the grid to overtake Marc Marquez for the lead and cross the line in second place.

It appeared to be KTM’s first podium of the season and Vinales’ first top ten with the team – until FIM Stewards confirmed his front tyre pressure was below the legal minimum for more than 60% of the laps.

Vinales was handed the standard 16-second penalty, dropping him to 14th and promoting Franco Morbidelli to third behind Marquez and Francesco Bagnaia.

“It is quite obvious that we are leaving Qatar with a huge bitter taste after we were handed a late penalty,” said Goyon. “Maverick Vinales had an unbelievable weekend, with his best qualifying of the season.

“Today, he showed an incredible level of performance, riding at a strong pace fighting with the top guys at the front. The bike was fast, and he clocked in the second fastest race lap, so everything was working well.”

“A rule that can sometimes be unfair”

Vinales almost certainly fell foul of the tyre pressure rule because his team hadn’t anticipated he would spend five laps leading the race in clean, cool air.

 “Unfortunately we took a penalty for low tyre pressure, a rule that can sometimes be unfair, but rules are rules and we have to accept them,” Goyon said.

“It does not take away his performance which we will keep in our mind heading to the next round, so thank you Maverick for a strong weekend.”

Vinales, fresh from celebrating a podium finish with his fourth different brand of MotoGP bike, brushed off the penalty.

“The bike was amazing, everything clicked together… I can’t wait to be back on the bike already!”

Red Bull KTM Factory boss Aki Ajo said: “The podium potential by Maverick is important for the whole KTM family… we will now push even harder.”

A change in weight balance gave Maverick Vinales the braking stability he’d been seeking on the KTM RC16.

After following the likes of Marc Marquez and Francesco Bagnaia during practice at COTA, the new Tech3 rider is now setting his sights on improving the ‘neutral’ phase of cornering as MotoGP heads to round four in Qatar this weekend.

Vinales reached Qualifying 2 for the first time this season at COTA and felt he had the potential to fight for a top five.

However, technical issues saw him fail to finish the Sprint and then ride from the pit lane to 14th in the delayed grand prix. Along the way, Vinales set a best race lap just 0.065s slower than the fastest KTM of team-mate Enea Bastianini.

“I am sure that without the grid issues, Maverick would have ended close to the top 5,” said Tech3 team manager Nicolas Goyon.

Now Vinales arrives at a Lusail circuit where he won twice as a Yamaha rider, in 2017 and 2021.

“We are heading to Qatar with a good feeling after the improvements made last week in Austin,” Vinales said.

“For sure the outcome was not the one we wanted, but I felt fast and competitive all weekend for the first time this season, and all I want to do is go to Qatar and continue working in that direction.

“Doha is a track that I like a lot, where I have had good results in the past, so let’s try to be competitive straight from Friday, and see how it goes for the weekend.

“It is always special to race at night, so I am excited.”

“It is more under control”

KTM is the only manufacturer without a top-five finish in any of the six races so far this season.

So what was the change that helped Vinales find form after a difficult pre-season?

“We did it in warm-up in Argentina,” Vinales explained. “Basically I was looking to have more rear weight. Trying to control a little bit better the rear slide when I go into the corner.

“This is very important because I can now hit the lines I like.

“You could see on the videos that we always got sideways in braking, but I wanted to have it so that – even if it goes sideways – it is more under control.

“Then I can hit the apex in a better way, and touch the gas better. It all starts from the braking. But still there is room to improve further.”

“The neutral area” for KTM’s Maverick Vinales

With his braking improved, Vinales then got a clearer idea of the next area to focus on while following Ducati Lenovo riders Marc Marquez and Francesco Bagnaia during practice at COTA.

“With this new setup and weight balance, I feel much more comfortable,” he said.

“And now that I’m faster, I can understand really well where we have to improve next.

“I was able to do some laps behind Pecco, some laps behind Marc, and I saw clearly where we are missing and where the bike is good.”

The ten-time MotoGP race winner added: “If we divide the corner into areas – braking, neutral area and gas – I think we are good on gas. The traction of the bike is quite good. So in this area, we are well set.

“Now, for me, the area we need to improve is the neutral area, when you release the front brake. There the bike doesn’t turn, so you open [the gas] with more degrees of lean on the exit.

“So I can see very clearly where we have to go.”

Vibration and more extreme chatter problems have been an issue for all of the KTMs, with the new big ‘salad box’ on the back of the RC16 believed to offer a minor improvement.

“Still we are not 100% on the package,” said Vinales. But we are seeing the light. So that’s nice,” said Vinales.

Enea Bastianini was the fastest rider on track during the closing laps of the COTA MotoGP, as he completed an impressive 17th to 7th recovery.

Bastianini’s second top ten of the season has put the Tech3 rider between factory riders Brad Binder and Pedro Acosta for twelfth in the early world championship standings.

More importantly, Bastianini believes his COTA charge was made possible by a set-up change, rather than his renowned tyre-saving skills.

That gives the Italian optimism as he heads to another of his favourite circuits, Lusail, venue for this weekend’s Qatar round.

“We did a good step forward in Austin, I felt good in the race and we got a great result from 17th on the grid to 7th, and I think that we can do another step this week in Qatar,” said Bastianini, a Qatar winner for Gresini Ducati in 2022.

“Lusail is one of my favourite tracks, where we had great moments in the past, so I am really curious to go there and see how we will perform with the KTM.”

Recalling Austin, Bastianini explained: “For warm-up, we changed something again on the bike and I was confident for the race.

“In the last 4-5 laps me and Bezzecchi were the fastest riders on track and I felt ‘together’ with the bike for the first time.

“In Thailand, I was fast in the race, but I rode with a lot of confidence for the first time at COTA.

“We did a great job with the team because we did not start very well but we left very happy.”

Like most KTM riders, Bastianini has been struggling to control vibration from the rear tyre but also felt the bike lacked stability.

“Vibration has been the main problem with the bike,” he confirmed. “But also one of the worst problems was the stability, it was so difficult for me to push.

“It happened also [in the COTA race] but just at the start. When the tyre grip dropped it was coming better.”

Yet to break the top five in any race so far this season,  KTM has a decent recent record at Qatar, including last year’s double podium by Brad Binder.

“[Qatar] is a track that usually suits our bike, and last season, there was a KTM on both sprints and race podiums,” said Tech3 team manager Nicolas Goyon.

“Both Enea Bastianini and Maverick Viñales are arriving from Austin with an improved feeling on the bike.

“Enea scored his best KTM result, and has most importantly felt better and more in control on the KTM.

“In addition, both of them had some important aerodynamics tests last week, which will for sure help them find extra speed.

“All in one, I am confident that they will both arrive in Doha with a lot of motivation, and we can’t wait to get back on track with them.”

Team-mate Maverick Vinales is also a former Qatar MotoGP winner, in 2017 and 2021 for Yamaha.

Of the many surreal moments during Sunday’s chaotic COTA MotoGP start delay, one of the most bizarre involved Maverick Vinales running alongside the grid in search of his Tech3 KTM – just before the start was officially postponed.

In the aftermath of Marc Marquez’s dramatic last-minute sprint for his spare bike, Vinales was one of many riders who also dashed into pit lane.

But while the rest swapped onto their dry machines, Vinales reappeared at the back of the grid – then ran alongside the track to intercept his mechanics as they wheeled his original machine off the grid.

Vinales: “I thought the red flag had been shown”

“We were on the grid, I was with wet tyres, and the plan was to start [the race] and then swap bikes,” Vinales explained.

“But as many riders started to leave, I thought Race Direction had shown the red flag so everyone could have the same chances.”

With the start then officially delayed on safety grounds due to the number of riders, bikes and pit staff on the grid and in the pitlane area, Vinales was back on the grid for the restart. 

But his troubles weren’t over yet.

More Drama: Stalled Bike Forces Pitlane Start

Vinales’ nightmare continued when his bike stalled twice, forcing him to abandon his tenth-place grid slot and start from pit lane.

“When we returned to the grid, the bike stopped twice, so I had to start from the pit lane, which was unlucky,” he said.

That left the Spaniard in last place by over ten seconds.

Vinales fought back to claim 14th, setting the ninth-fastest lap of the race.

“To be honest, I felt really good, I had a good rhythm, and we have clearly made improvements this weekend, so all I want is to continue in that direction with the team,” he said.

“Today, we had the level to be inside the top five, so we need to keep believing that we can achieve that target. Qatar in two weeks can be a good track to do it, so let’s keep going.”

Vinales’ team-mate Enea Bastianini was one of only three riders to correctly gamble on slicks for the original grid. 

But with the race restart allowing everyone to switch bikes and tyres, the Italian lost his advantage and finished seventh in the restarted race.

Enea Bastianini was one of three riders, already on slicks, to lose out when the start of Sunday’s COTA MotoGP was delayed.

Last-minute chaos as other riders abandoned their wet bikes and ran back to the pits for dry machines prompted Race Direction to delay the start on safety grounds.

MotoGP’s ‘Quick Start’ procedure – which the rules state ‘may be invoked by Race Direction as necessary… for example a delayed start’ – was then triggered.

This allows riders to make ‘a change of machine’ in pit lane. 

Those previously on wet bikes thus returned on dry bikes and lined up in their original grid positions, with none of the ride-through penalties (that would have been given if the start wasn’t delayed) carrying over to the ‘new’ race.

“It’s not completely correct”

The original slick trio of Bastianini, Ai Ogura and Brad Binder could have been in podium contention if the race had started as planned.

“From my side, probably it’s not correct,” Bastianini said. “Because you take risk, I was with dry tyres and in that moment it was still a bit wet.

“We tried to do it but after Marquez left from the grid and many riders followed him, we restarted the race, but in the [original] positions.

“And from my side, it’s not completely correct.”

However, Honda’s Luca Marini – who also stayed on the grid, albeit on wets – felt Race Direction had little choice given the sheer number of people and bikes involved in the confusion.

“I think the Race Direction managed it in a very good way, in a safe way, I would say. So, good job to them,” said Marini.

Bastianini: “I felt good for the first time on this bike”

While Bastianini was denied a potential podium, he salvaged seventh place at the restart, his best finish since joining Tech3 KTM.

“I am happy about my race, it has been the best one since the start of the season,” said the former Ducati COTA race winner.

“I was riding very well from the middle until the end of the race, and I felt good for probably the first time on this bike.

“We have found a good direction that we will need to check in the next round.”

Tech3 team manager Nicolas Goyon saw the result as a sign of things to come.

“Enea did a good job this weekend, he is getting better and better on the bike, and seventh place is a great reward for his work.”

Team-mate Maverick Vinales overcame a pit lane start for 14th place.

Empty-handed at the Thai season opener, Maverick Vinales scored his first MotoGP points as a KTM rider with twelfth place in Argentina.

The Spaniard had only gained one position from 19th on the grid in the Saturday Sprint but, boosted by a ‘better base’ and 11th place in the warm-up, made swift progress in the grand prix.

Vinales reached 15th by lap 5, was handed 14th by a long lap penalty for Raul Fernandez, then picked off Fermin Aldeguer and Jack Miller to finish in 13th, 0.7s behind Yamaha’s Alex Rins.

That later became twelfth place when Ai Ogura was disqualified.

“It has been an important weekend for us,” said former Suzuki, Yamaha and Aprilia race winner Vinales. “We did not start as we wanted, but we recovered a lot of information that has brought us to a better feeling overall.”

Vinales’ best grand prix lap was only 0.2s slower than he had done in the half-distance Sprint.

“I rode much better than [the Sprint], and it gave me extra motivation for the next round,” he said.

“I think that we found a way to go, and I felt much more comfortable on the bike, so I am looking forward to the next round.”

Tech3 Team Manager: “A decent result”

Team manager Nicolas Goyon praised Vinales’ fightback but admitted there’s still work to do.

“Maverick produced a great effort with a P13 finish from 19th on the grid.

“It is of course not what we are targeting, but it is a decent result, especially that it seems that Maverick found a better base on the bike this morning, which was confirmed in the race. This is what we are looking for.”

The next round at COTA was the scene of Vinales’ perfect weekend for Aprilia last year.

Bastianini Battles Back After Early Crash

Meanwhile, team-mate Enea Bastianini, who salvaged ninth on his Tech3 debut at Buriram, wasn’t able to exploit his tyre-saving skills after falling in early contact with Fernandez.

The Italian re-joined 12 seconds behind last place before eventually overtaking rookie Somkiat Chantra for 18th in the closing laps.

“My race finished early unfortunately after Raul Fernandez pushed me out in T9 as he arrived too fast, and I crashed, which was a great shame because I took a strong start, already fighting for 13th after one lap,” Bastianini said.

“I got up to re-join the race, to take the experience and see how my feeling was, even if I was missing the wing on the left side.

“Our pace was good today despite the strange sensation without one wing. Tyres dropped a lot in the final laps, but I pushed a lot in the middle as I gave everything to come back.

“In the end, we made the gap, and at least I did not finish last, but it was just an unfortunate race for us.”

Factory KTM riders Brad Binder and Pedro Acosta were the top RC16s over the finish line, in seventh and eighth places but 14 seconds adrift of winner Marc Marquez (Ducati).