After the long break, we were all wondering whether we could be competitive at Jerez too — a track where Aprilias have always struggled a bit.

Friday went better than expected — third in pre-qualifying, straight through to Q2. On the soft some old problems came back, but there was still margin to work with. That was fine.

Saturday was a bad day, and not through any fault of our own.

Wet qualifying, fourth on the grid. Then the Sprint: at the start a tear-off got stuck under my bike. I released the clutch and the tyre spun on top of it — I lost I don’t know how many positions in a second. I was fighting back, recovering, then the rain came. I pitted a lap late, came back out on rain tyres, and crashed.

There’s not much to say about situations like that. It happens. Not much you can do.

Sunday is a different day, though.

I wasn’t feeling great physically, I have to admit. Something that stayed with me all weekend and that I tried to manage without letting it get to me. But at the start something clicked — a great launch, I recovered two positions into the first corners, and found myself chasing Alex and Marc Marquez.

In the early laps I tried to stay with them — I knew they were fast. On lap 2 Marc made a mistake at Turn 11 and I moved up to second. Alex was ahead, and in those fast, flowing sectors — three and four — he simply had more. I made a mistake at Turn 1 mid-race, he pulled away, and that’s when I knew the win wasn’t on today.

I managed the rest of the race keeping Diggia behind me. Second place.

That’s fine — Alex was just stronger today. I gave everything I had on a weekend where we struggled more than usual.

I’m happy with how it went. And tomorrow there’s an important test. Back to work.