Aleix Espargaro has a strong track record at Aragon but he feels he 'arrived a bit late' to challenge Bastianini and Bagnaia for victory in this year's MotoGP race.
Asked whether he was disappointed not to fight for the win given his expectations, Espargaro said: “No, because I did a big mistake on Friday. I crashed twice, I lost a lot of track time, I lost a lot of confidence.“But session by session I improved a little bit, I did a solid qualifying, but I arrived a bit late in the race.“You just need to see the lap times they did in the qualifying, also the pace in the race.
“The expectations were very, very high before arriving to Aragon because I knew it was one of the best tracks of the last part of the championship,” he added. “So, maybe I started a little bit too hot and I crashed twice on Friday. So, I lost the confidence completely. “From FP3 on I started to build up the confidence. I did a good qualifying, a solid fourth place, and then in the race I didn’t have the pace to follow Enea and Pecco.
“I knew it, they had something else during the weekend. But in the end, third place is super good for the championship, so I’m happy to be back on the podium.”