Why MotoGP's smallest manufacturer now belongs in the elite class

Aprilia unveiled the long-awaited "revolution" of its RS-GP MotoGP bike at last weekend's Sepang pre-season test, which was met with praise from its number one rider Aleix Espargaro after a positive six days of running during the shakedown and the official test.

In doing so, Aprilia has already passed its first major challenge with its new bike.

Espargaro is not one to shy away from letting his feelings be known, and hosted many a frustrated media debrief across the 2019 season as he fumed at Aprilia's lack of progress with a bike he felt had the ingredients to be a strong package.

This came to a head at Misano, when he vented his anger at Aprilia for not bringing any upgrades to a recent test at the circuit. Aprilia racing manager Romano Albesiano publicly refuted this, which led to another public retort from Espargaro countering Albesiano's claims.

Test rider Bradley Smith told Autosport that same weekend that work was going on behind the scenes, and Espargaro just had to be patient.

But since an unrepresentative seventh at Aragon - a result pinned on the nature of the circuit masking the RS-GP's weaknesses - was Espargaro's only top eight result of the campaign, that patience was being sorely tested. And with what at the time seemed like a volatile rider market in the offing, Aprilia ran the risk of alienating one of only two elements giving the factory any true credibility in MotoGP.

Aprilia's return to MotoGP as a factory entrant in 2015 was underwhelming, as a glorified RSV4 failed to set the world alight. This was never the intended purpose however, as Aprilia merely sought to be in the game ahead of MotoGP's switch to unified electronics the following season.

The RS-GP made decent progress in 2016 and, in the hands of new signing Espargaro, managed to equal its best-ever MotoGP result of sixth - twice - in '17.

But progress slowed the following year, as Aprilia's first attempt to make a big leap by rotating its engine within its chassis went awry. This ultimately robbed the bike of its key strength in cornering, and it took most of the year to find a way forward.

A 12-lap long run on Sunday proved one of the strongest of the entire field, with a series of hugely competitive mid-1m59s laps demonstrating the step forward the RS-GP has made

The 2020 RS-GP is completely re-designed from its predecessor. Most notably, it sports a 90-degree V4 engine in a bid to find power to match the supersonic Hondas and Ducatis.

Speed trap figures at Sepang are a bit misleading, as the actual sensor is located at the exact point where most are touching the brakes for Turn 1 - thus, the braver you are the faster you appear to go. Pramac Ducati's Jack Miller's best of 337.5km/h came as a result of exactly this, though Ducati still has an edge in this area regardless.

Espargaro was close to 10km/h down on this with 330.2km/h, though this is roughly four km/h faster than his best speed during last year's Malaysian Grand Prix weekend. It may not appear like a lot, but small gains in power can be just as beneficial as big ones if your bike is nimble.

The Spaniard beamed over the bike's improved turning over last year's RS-GP, claiming it to be "even more" potent than his beloved 2017-spec bike and reminding him of the Forward Yamaha he rode to second at Aragon in 2014 - which he regards as "one of the best bikes" he ever rode. Stability has also improved, a key issue of last year's bike.

Espargaro ended the test 10th overall, just 0.345s off the pace. But more impressively, a 12-lap long run on Sunday proved one of the strongest of the entire field, as a series of hugely competitive mid-1m59s laps demonstrated the step forward the RS-GP has made.

But perhaps the biggest improvement, and the ultimate key in making Aprilia's revolution a reality, is how the team is now working. This is down to the second element boosting Aprilia's credibility: CEO Massimo Rivola.

Rivola joined the brand last year following a near-decade stint with Ferrari in Formula 1 as sporting director, during which time he also oversaw the Scuderia's young driver programme - which, amongst others, produced F1's newest star Charles Leclerc.

Espargaro noted Rivola had brought ideas from his vast F1 career - which also included roles with Toro Rosso and Minardi - to the Aprilia box last year by introducing in-garage radio communication between rider and mechanic. But much more significant than that, claims Espargaro, Rivola has now moulded Aprilia into what it should be - a factory team.

"He's coming from a completely different world, but he's a really smart guy and what he's doing is improving every area and making it like [we are] working as a big team," Espargaro told Autosport.

"I think in the past, Aprilia has always been a very big brand. But we were working a little bit like a small team and this was a mistake. Now every single area of the team has improved and grown."

Rivola (below) saw continual growth in Aprilia across the 2019 season, and increased budget and resources from parent company Piaggio has allowed the Italian marque to poach key personnel from Ducati and Suzuki, as well as ex-Ferrari and McLaren F1 personnel.

But Rivola is not trying to create the Ferrari of MotoGP with Aprilia. He believes "MotoGP has to stay as MotoGP, and Formula 1 is Formula 1", and though he concedes that certain elements of running a major effort such as Ferrari can be transposed onto a smaller outfit, it's almost impossible for a smaller team to run itself at Ferrari F1 levels - not least MotoGP's smallest factory team, in terms of manpower and resources.

"Formula 1 is a place where you invest more money, you have more people and you are a bigger organisation," Rivola tells Autosport.

"It's true that you find some ways to work that are good for that kind of system and it's easier to bring less people [a smaller team]. The other way around is more difficult to apply."

After the final day at Sepang, Espargaro reckoned he could have been in podium contention if the field was to race on the Monday

Expanding on this, he adds: "The method is to find good people that can put both hands on the table and go 'this was my experience, that is your experience, let's try to match our experience and find a solution'.

"If we are all open to put this on the table, we will find better solutions. If we close each other [down] and keep our experience [to ourselves] and go 'I know how to do it, follow me', this is not the approach we want."

In November, Espargaro said it was his goal to replicate what Andrea Dovizioso has done at Ducati since joining in 2013, helping to guide it from struggling midfielder to championship challenger in recent years.

Rivola admires Espargaro's aims, and but admits Aprilia is "not crazy about going to the podium now". Instead, Rivola wants Aprilia's revolution to continue to steadily build, to keep the "good base we have in terms of good people".

This may sound anticlimactic, but losing teams in motorsport have a tendency to hire and fire with reckless abandon in a desperate bid to reclaim missing glory. Aprilia is the strongest it has ever been and Rivola is right not to want to disrupt that when a true breakthrough doesn't appear to be a million miles off.

After the final day at Sepang, Espargaro reckoned he could have been in podium contention if the field was to race on the Monday. But he also noted that it's one thing to be quick and another to actually get to a finish. Thus far, the new RS-GP is yet to complete a full race distance.

The new Aprilia was only ready at the end of last month, while the likes of Honda have been testing prototype 2020 bikes since last summer. Espargaro's strong long run on Sunday was cut short by an exhaust problem, and he highlighted that every time he truly tried to stress the bike at Sepang, another issue would crop up.

Add to this the fact that Aprilia is still struggling under acceleration relative to its rivals. Espargaro admitted after following Alex Marquez's Honda briefly during the test that "there was no way" he could overtake because the RC213V can punch out of the corners much better.

Aprilia at least won't be shackled by the engine development freeze imposed on Honda, Yamaha, Suzuki and Ducati before the first race, but with the focus of the final three days of testing in Qatar later this month on reliability, it will be some time before Espargaro is truly a podium contender.

But this doesn't really matter, because the potential is very obviously present with the 2020 RS-GP.

Rivola's restructuring and methodical approach has birthed what is easily the best MotoGP bike Aprilia has ever built and, for the first time since its comeback, Aprilia now looks like it truly belongs in motorcycle racing's elite class.