Pedro Acosta finished sixth in Indonesian GP sprint after long-lap penalty
NXTbets Pro | Published On: October 10, 2026
KTM pace gap
Acosta said KTM was chasing Ducati and Aprilia at the Indonesian Grand Prix because both factories had taken a clear step forward since 2025. Acosta said the RC16 had not changed much, and he did not frame KTM as worse than last season. He said the difference was that the opposition had improved more, which had left KTM with less room at the front. The Aprilias made the strongest impression for him. Acosta called their pace “incredible,” said they looked especially strong in the second sector and said they were also quick on medium Michelin tires. That picture shaped his weekend from the start at Mandalika. After Friday practice, he said his focus was on closing the gap to Aprilia, and he described himself as “the best of the rest” behind the three Aprilias of Raul Fernandez, Marco Bezzecchi and Jorge Martin. Even there, the numbers showed how much ground KTM still had to make up. Acosta said he was still losing about four-tenths of a second in the second sector alone, a margin that pointed to where the lap time was disappearing and why the Aprilias had opened such a clear edge.
Friday practice pace
Friday practice gave Acosta a clearer read on the size of the gap and the areas that cost him time. He finished fourth in the session with a lap of 1:29.394, 0.669 seconds slower than Raul Fernandez, who topped the run with a 1:28.725. That left Acosta close to the leading group in the order but well behind the fastest benchmark. He said the Aprilias were the key reference point, and the session backed up that view. His own comments centered on the second sector, where he said he was giving up about four-tenths of a second on its own. That sort of split leaves little doubt about where the pace battle stood. Acosta also said Mandalika had decent grip despite several crashes, which added another layer to the weekend’s pace picture. He did not present KTM’s Friday form as a breakthrough. He used it as a measure of the work still ahead, especially against the Aprilias that looked strongest on the medium Michelin tires. The result fit the wider pattern he described, with KTM still in the fight but unable to match the rate of improvement shown by Ducati and Aprilia. For Acosta, Friday was about measuring the deficit as much as chasing a position, and the session gave him both the positive of a top-four finish and the harder reality of a gap that remained in the places that mattered most.
Saturday sprint finish
Saturday brought a more difficult race outcome, even if Acosta still left the sprint with a sixth-place finish. He qualified ninth at the Indonesian Grand Prix, then served a long-lap penalty in the 13-lap sprint for exceeding track limits. The penalty and the qualifying position shaped his afternoon, and he said the weekend came with instability and “massive shakes” throughout. Acosta also said yellow flags canceled three of his four laps on one late run, which cut into his chance to improve his grid spot. He believed a top-five finish was the best KTM could have achieved after the poor qualifying session, a view that matched the limitations he felt in the bike. He said he matched his qualifying lap time from the previous year at Mandalika, which suggested the weekend pace was close to what he had carried there before even if the field around him had moved on. Acosta also said he still did not know what went wrong in Japan and that the KTM was working better on Saturday than on Sunday there, another reminder that the team was still looking for consistency from venue to venue. Even with the issues, he kept his record at the Indonesian venue strong. He finished second in both of the previous two Indonesian Grands Prix, a run that showed Mandalika had suited him better in earlier visits than it did this time around.
