Aprilia's MotoGP problems go far beyond Martin's absence
Jorge Martin's absence from Aprilia so far this year due to injury isn't the only explanation for its disappointing form. Here's what it needs to fix to have any chance of a turnaround
Though the chances of Aprilia keeping the #1 plate it acquired via Jorge Martin’s arrival were always slim, going into the 2025 MotoGP season even that unlikely outcome felt more plausible than the current reality of its factory squad being a distant 10th in the teams’ standings.
And though Aprilia’s effectively been a one-rider team in Martin’s absence given his stand-in Lorenzo Savadori has used every race weekend as a test and development programme, it’s not like Marco Bezzecchi has delivered much - not just failing to even reach the podium so far in 2025, but never looking especially close to doing so.
After half a decade in which Aprilia’s rise from embarrassing backmarker that kept sacking riders to genuine title contender has been such a heartwarming story, it’s now effectively absent from what should have been its biggest season yet, and that’s not just because of Martin.
If he were racing right now, he’d be grappling with a far less wieldy RS-GP than he’d have expected to get.
Even in its tail-end days, Aprilia’s corner-entry prowess was noted by rival riders on much better bikes. But that stability has been lost on the 2025 bike - not just on turn-in and braking where the previous designs had been especially strong, but on acceleration and corner exit as well.
Bezzecchi hasn’t helped himself with errors such as his early trip off the road in the Spanish Grand Prix and difficulty executing single laps smoothly in qualifying, but how frequently he talks about getting a “big, big shake” of the kind that triggered his Jerez excursion shows this isn’t just a rider squandering opportunities.
Aprilia feels aero changes (an area that was such a strength before) are needed, but it only has one shot at getting this right given the homologation rules around aerodynamic updates. It trialled some ideas on that front in Monday’s Jerez test, and has also run a new carbon swingarm that it hopes could solve some of those stability worries without having to turn to aero upgrades.
There had been early flashes of potential that suggested Aprilia would be basically fine - or fine enough - while Martin was sidelined: Bezzecchi’s strong runs late in pre-season testing, Trackhouse rookie Ai Ogura’s stunning start to MotoGP at the season-opening Thai Grand Prix.
Those were misleading, but for reasons that seem logical in hindsight.
It was Bezzecchi’s race-stint runs that seemed so encouraging in testing and that’s the area where he’s still tending to deliver even now.
His times relative to winner Alex Marquez on the well-sorted 2024-spec Gresini Ducati were confidence-boosting whenever he got clear air during his comeback ride from 23rd to 14th at Jerez. 
It’s often been clear in races that he has the speed to do far better if he’d started higher up, but the same instability that’s stopping him nail a full qualifying lap tidily isn’t going to help when you have a train of slower bikes to try to outbrake in races because you qualified behind them.
It’s still Ogura who provides the most comfort for Aprilia, though. Discount his troubled Trackhouse team-mate Raul Fernandez for now. Fernandez’s post-race Jerez comments that “I don’t understand anything on the bike” and “I am slow. I am really slow” will be partly due to the 2025 Aprilia but even more due to his lack of affinity with it and his current confidence rut. Fernandez has his own problems.
It’s understandable that Ogura hasn’t yet replicated his Buriram race heroics as they were certainly helped by all the testing time he had at the circuit (note that he was still by far the best rookie there, though).
But he’s Aprilia’s top rider in the championship by one point over Bezzecchi and if an Aprilia’s catching your attention in the races, it tends to be Ogura’s. His riding style and late-braking habits seem to allow him to improvise around the stability problems enough. And it’s easy to imagine a fit and healthy Martin doing the same given his own style.
Aprilia had a complete fresh start with both works riders and technical leadership over the winter as Romano Albesiano left for Honda and Fabiano Sterlacchini (below) came in.
That’s not a great situation to be in when your development path goes awry and gives you a problem to solve, but Sterlacchini’s contribution to Ducati’s rise when working alongside Gigi Dall’Igna shows he too can turn a bike with potential but problems around.
There’s still a possibility that by the time Martin is finally recovered, Aprilia will have found its solutions and deployed the aero upgrade that unlocks its 2025 bike’s pace in a sustainable way.
But right now, the manufacturer that went into 2025 with the most hope and expectation for a big step forward is just not a factor at all in the fight at the front.
