As recently as the start of this season, Aprilia MotoGP rider Aleix Espargaro was contemplating whether his current contract, set to expire at the end of the 2022 season, would be his final one as he becomes one of the elders of the grid and as his young family back at home continues to grow up with him absent for a significant part of every year.
Yet, with Sunday’s exceptional result at the Argentine Grand Prix, that thought seems to have been banished, at least for now. Finally breaking his duck and taking an absolutely definitive victory in his 200th race, it means that he says he is now very much set to stay in the championship for at least one more season.
“It would not be fair to myself to stop right now,” the 32-year-old said after taking the victory. “I think that after all the hard work I’ve done, I’ve never won before, I’ve never led the championship, I’ve never been one of the fastest ones before. To be fair to myself I think it’s good to race at least one or two more years.
“Physically I feel really good, and I’m enjoying riding. I don’t really care about the future beyond this year, but for sure I have more energy to continue racing.
“At the same time, I have to say that it’s very difficult to be far from my family, very very hard.
“Obviously if I’m able to win races and be at the front of the championship, it makes everything a little easier so let’s just try and keep the momentum.”
That’s because the current situation now is not just a case of being a race winner in MotoGP, though. With that victory came an arguably even bigger prize: the lead of the world championship, also for the first time in his life.
“The championship lead is 100% more important than the win,” he told The Race after the victory. “I’ve said it many times before, but a victory will not change my life. I’m very happy, a very lucky man, because I have the dream of my life, which was my family.
“Three years ago, let’s say, I built it, and my job is my passion so winning won’t change it. But to lead the most difficult championship of the past seasons, maybe even ever, is unbelievable – but it’s not lucky.
“We truly deserve it, because we raced and won. I’ll try to keep my feet on the ground, but no one gives you anything for free so if we’re there it’s because we deserve it and I’ll try to chase it until Valencia, as much as I can.”
He’s also absolutely certain where that improvement has come from. Bringing a bike for 2022 that cosmetically remains quite similar to the 2021 machine despite having relatively smaller packaging, the real change lies underneath – with a more refined engine the real key to Espargaro and team-mate Maverick Vinales’ form so far this year.
“The bike has improved a lot,” he insisted, “the team has the stability that I’ve missed in the past, and the engine is strong. You need a strong engine to fight for the championship in MotoGP and if you don’t have it then it’s very difficult. Fabio [Quartararo] is a very good rider, the Yamaha is a super good bike, but you can see how he is struggling because if you don’t have the engine it is very difficult.
“This year, we have the engine, and this will be the key for the championship. We have to just cross our fingers now that we can keep this momentum.”
Before spending too much time worrying about the future, however, there’s another perhaps more important job for Espargaro in the days leading up to next weekend’s back-to-back race at the Circuit of the Americas in Texas: trying to force himself to relax and enjoy the moment rather than being his normal self and over-analysing how to fix all his remaining issues with the bike.
“Sincerely, I will try to enjoy this moment,” Espargaro told The Race. “I have a problem, that things are never enough for me, as a character. This is not good, because I’m already thinking here about some solutions from Termas to fix the areas where we struggled in Austin last year a lot. But last year we were very good in Portimao and Jerez, so I want to fight for the win there again, to fight for the championship.
“But I need to completely forget this for now, because it has been very, very, very difficult to achieve what we’ve achieved and I need to try and enjoy it with my team. They are like a family, and I need to at least have 48 hours to think about the present and not the future.
“I don’t really like to party, but I think tonight will be an exception.”
