Can KTM dare to dream big in MotoGP’s second Jerez race?

"Isn't it strange?", so Bruce Dickinson bellows in Iron Maiden's 1986 'Somewhere In Time' deep cut 'Déjà vu'. MotoGP bikes returned to the Jerez circuit just five days after the chequered flag fell on the Spanish Grand Prix to commence practice for the very first Andalusian GP - motorcycle grand prix racing's first ever double-header at the same track.

FP1 went very much to the form you'd expect after Yamaha secured its first MotoGP 1-2 since 2017 last Sunday courtesy of Petronas SRT's Fabio Quartararo and Maverick Vinales on the works team-run M1, with Vinales leading the morning times from team-mate Valentino Rossi.

However, in third place was Brad Binder, who - off-track excursion on lap seven last Sunday - had a stunning debut outing in MotoGP, displaying pace that bettered that of the race winners in the last 10 laps and easily qualified him for a crack at the top five.

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In fifth spot came his team-mate Pol Espargaro, who said after finishing just a second from KTM's first dry MotoGP podium in sixth that the Austrian manufacturer was "in the game" now - at least at Jerez. What luck, then, that we have second outing at the lovely Andalusian venue.

In FP2 on Friday for 'MotoGP Jerez: The sequel', Espargaro led the session for a bit and ended up completing the top three, while Binder was 11th in a session he focused exclusively on race set-up.

Armed to the teeth with four day's worth of data from last weekend's Spanish GP plus the test on the Wednesday before it, and set-up already dialled in, a second race at the same track presents a unique opportunity to take the step you missed first time around.

Both of the factory team KTMs easily had podium pace, and Espargaro - having followed Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso and SRT's Franco Morbidelli on the Yamaha for much of the race - reckoned the RC16 is better almost everywhere compared to the machines which filled the podium.

"Actually, we are faster everywhere, just we are losing on the straight against Ducati," Espargaro said of the Desmosedici last week. "I promise you we are faster on brakes, we are faster entering the corner, we are faster in the corner speed - just they have traction maybe a little bit better, but just the top speed [is where we lose]."

As for the Yamaha, he said: "Every time Dovi was pushing a little bit harder, we were doing a better lap time and I was completely sticking to Dovi. And we were leaving Morbidelli behind, so we were taking some gap to him."

"Actually what we are using now is something that we were asking for a lot of times in the past, some consistency on the race weekend" Pol Espargaro

Now, Morbidelli's 'A-spec' M1 is slightly different to that of Quartararo and Vinales, but not a whole lot different. But the most encouraging thing is that the KTM is working in sweltering conditions. Track temperatures across last weekend and this afternoon verged on what you'd see on the thermostat in hell, and this was always an issue for the RC16 in previous seasons.

In last year's Spanish GP at Jerez, Espargaro languished 13th, 20s from the win, in a race where track temperatures hit 42 degrees Celsius. The RC16 showed flashes of speed last year - Espargaro's sixth at Le Mans in the dry the highlight - but in the hands of Espargaro, Johann Zarco and Miguel Oliveira it only saw the top 10 on 10 occasions. That's not exactly consistent when compared to the Yamaha, Ducati, Honda and Suzuki.

And yet it began this season, in the bike's worst-suited conditions, staring at the podium. The step forward has been exceptional, and as Espargaro said when asked by Autosport to explain it, there are a combination of things that have led to it.

"Actually what we are using now is something that we were asking for a lot of times in the past, some consistency on the race weekend," Espargaro said on Friday at Jerez. "We tested some of these things starting from last year, but we couldn't put [all together] until the end of the year or even in the pre-season.

"For sure Dani [Pedrosa] was testing some of them together with Mika [Kallio]. I was proving that they were okay or not in the race weekend on the lap time. So, we were working a lot, especially on the race distance.

"This new chassis, it's a little bit more stiff on the side. It's helping us to have less movement on the bike and then I was working quite a lot of this pre-season on the electronics to try to solve the problems because Dani had a different way of using the electronics and I was not really happy with it.

"I went into my way and finally we all are using that way of electronics. But all of us, we are putting all of ourselves on those improvements and also Brad is giving quite good info about what we can use. It's teamwork."

Espargaro ended Friday of the Andalusian GP - which he branded one of the best days of the year - feeling "strong enough to fight for something great" on the RC16. His FP2 was interrupted by a crash at Turn 2 with 20 minutes remaining, so he never managed to string a consistent run together.

While FP4 on Saturday will give the clearest indication of race pace (as will always be the caveat of these Friday features), Espargaro's 1m37.889s, which put him third in FP2, was set on a soft rear tyre with 17 laps already on it. As we saw last week, Binder's last 10 laps were almost all quicker than those of Quartararo and Vinales. At the end of FP2, the South African fired in a 1m38.774s on a rear soft that had done 22 laps (admittedly, not continuously).

Binder praised the bike for having a strong base set-up, which allowed him to try some tweaks in the afternoon session that, he admitted, put him into a bit of "chaos". But reverting to what he ran last weekend, immediately the feeling returned.

"The fantastic part was, here we started FP1 with a good base setting already and we knew exactly what our package was," Binder said.

"When we started to play a little bit, we got to a point where I had some problems going onto the back straight. It was quick to put the setting back in from the weekend and all of a sudden, everything was more or less back to normal. It's great to have that base setting to fall back on.

"This is what also makes it a little bit easier when you have two races in a row, because you're really given the opportunity to try and set your bike up the best possible and then just try to better it from there."

With no real need to go for ultimate lap times on Friday, having already done so a week ago, the true pecking order won't reveal itself until qualifying. And it's here where KTM must make its biggest step. Espargaro qualified seventh (although was promoted a place when Cal Crutchlow withdrew from the race because of injury) and was over half a second from the front row.

As Espargaro pointed out, he could stick quite comfortably with Dovizioso last Sunday. But he could do nothing to get ahead of the Ducati on the straight. While the KTM was sixth in the speedtraps today, at 287.2km/h versus the 289.5km/h from Dovizioso, the Ducati was able to go at 295km/h when the engine maps were turned up for qualifying, with Espargaro only able to get up to 288.7km/h.

"We have nothing to lose. When we have a chance to do something big, I will just risk everything to get a good result" Pol Espargaro

With the searing pace of the Yamaha in clear air, making Quartararo and Vinales likely bets to lock out the top two spots on the grid again, Espargaro needs to clear the Ducatis at the start and be as close to the front row (which he managed to secure in the dry at Misano last year) as possible.

The same can be said of Binder, who didn't get out of Q1 last week, if he wants a crack at the podium he is very much capable of. Even Tech3's Miguel Oliviera doesn't believe a podium is out of the question. Should Espargaro get himself into a prime position for lights out on Sunday, he will be a very dangerous prospect.

Realistically, KTM can't yet be considered a constant podium threat and Espargaro knows this. But while he is able to challenge for a rostrum placing at Jerez, he will go on the offensive because - as he rightly points out - he has absolutely "nothing to lose".

"For sure it will depend how good we can be in one lap, and if we can get a good start and go with the top guys we can do something big," he said.

"[I'm] really looking forward. It will be a risky race because we will need to push quite a lot to get a result back, but we have nothing to lose. For sure I would like to be top three at the end of the year [in the standings], but we know it's very difficult.

"When we have a chance to do something big, I will just risk everything to get a good result. We will see. At least I will make it fun."

Pictures courtesy of Dorna Sports