Álvaro Bautista returns to MotoGP this weekend as a wildcard for Ducati in the Malaysian GP. The World Superbike rider will be riding the Desmosedici GP23 in Sepang, a circuit he likes, and there is some expectation surrounding him.
The two-time Superbike world champion emphasized that his goal is, above all, to have fun, without focusing on results: ‘The expectations… nothing about the results, I’ll just try to have some fun, I’ll try to have a good feeling with the bike. Because it’s not the same to do a test, where you can try and you can get the pace step by step. But here it’s a really difficult track – I like a lot. The important thing is to have the feeling with the bike as soon as possible to get a good pace and try to have fun. About the result I don’t have expectations; I’ll just try to get the best feeling with the bike and try to do my best. And for sure to have fun, that’s the target’.
This season, Dani Pedrosa was in the fight for the podium at the San Marino GP in one of his two wildcards for KTM, but Bautista emphasized that their situations are opposite: ‘Especially for everybody is like to put more pressure on me, because they say: «If Dani can do it…». But we are in a different situation, because Dani has a lot of kilometers on KTM and he is really fast in Misano. For sure he missed some racing pace and I think he even can do better because missing the races it’s always more difficult when you have to race with other riders. In my case it’s the opposite: I have race pace, but I miss some experience with this bike. For that it’s importante to get the feeling with the bike as soon as possible and the rest we’ll see. For sure it’s good to see Dani fighting for those positions, but in this case for me maybe it’s not too good, because it’s like «if Dani can do it, maybe you can do it too». But we are in different situations for sure’.
In 2006, Troy Bayliss came from WSBK for a wildcard in MotoGP and achieved victory. Another comparison that Bautista considers not to be possible: ‘That time was so different from now. In that time it wasn’t the same tyre for everybody, they were using different tyres. It was a different situation and for sure I think now it’s quite impossible to do what Troy did in 2006. Also the level of the category is very, very close. Even if you are close about the lap time, maybe in the position you are too far, because there are 20 riders in one second. To be maybe 0.7s away from the first it’s a really nice time, but in the position is very back. So I don’t want to see the position, for me the performance that I can do this weekend it’s the important thing’.