Pecco Bagnaia finished sixth in the Austrian Grand Prix Sprint after choosing the medium rear tyre in a field largely committed to the soft. For the Ducati rider, the decision was also about preparation: he wanted to understand the motorcycle better ahead of the much longer race the following day.

Bagnaia was one of only three riders using the medium rear. He had already been required to go through Q1 for the fifth consecutive time, then made Q2 and took seventh on the grid. Overnight set-up work left him feeling somewhat better about rear grip than at previous rounds.

He said the revised balance allowed him to stop the bike more effectively and use the rear more to help it turn. Grip remains an issue, despite the step forward. Bagnaia did not detail the Ducati change, saying only that the team had tried something similar in a different way and that it worked somewhat better this time.

Pedrosa’s input

The tyre decision was also connected to advice from Dani Pedrosa. Speaking on DAZN the previous week, the former MotoGP rider had urged Bagnaia to place less emphasis on the immediate result and more on understanding the motorcycle. Bagnaia called that “a good suggestion” and applied the idea in the Sprint by prioritising information gathering.

Bagnaia did not expect the soft to provide a clear benefit beyond the first three laps. The medium, by contrast, gave him a way to work with the following day’s much longer race in mind. He also said that every Ducati is facing the same grip problem. In his view, dealing with the issue across the whole group could help the team find an improvement.