Francesco Guidotti fears ‘bad publicity’ for Pedro Acosta after what he’s seen from KTM, ‘like Honda did with Marc’

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Pedro Acosta is clearly unhappy at KTM right now. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s desperate to leave, but he wants far more than the RC16 can give on track.

After bagging his first pole position and five podiums as a rookie at satellite team Tech3, the natural next step for Acosta was race wins. But KTM have fallen further away from that target.

Over the first three races, none of their riders have finished higher than seventh (Enea Bastianini at the Americas Grand Prix and Brad Binder in Argentina). The factory squad are already 126 points behind Ducati.

Part of the reason for that is that Acosta has crashed twice already, wrecking his Thailand GP and ending his race in Austin. The 20-year-old appears to be overriding the bike rather than accepting its limitations.

Francesco Guidotti warns KTM they shouldn’t hold onto Pedro Acosta ‘at all costs’

KTM’s difficult start, in the midst of a still-ongoing financial crisis, has naturally intensified speculation over MotoGP’s next superstar. Acosta hates being called the next Marc Marquez, but it’s intended as the ultimate compliment.

Acosta is under contract until the end of 2026, and it’s unclear whether his deal contains a performance-based escape clause. But should he leave, it will be the next seismic transfer after Jorge Martin’s Aprilia switch and Marquez’s Honda exit.

While both of those riders were world champions when they moved on, Acosta is thought to be on that path too. Speaking to GPOne, Francesco Guidotti, who left his role as KTM team manager at the end of last season, admitted ‘it’s not a good situation’ right now.

To avoid too much ‘bad publicity’, KTM may have to let him go in the end. Unike Honda, they might realise that it’s ultimately for the best to let their franchise rider go.

“I don’t know how much he will want to [leave], he might even think, after doing so much together, that he doesn’t want it to be his limit,” Guidotti said. “Kind of like Honda did with Marc Marquez, keeping a rider at all costs can become bad publicity.

“If he crashes in every race, he’s not happy, he can’t talk bad about the bike but he can’t talk good about it either – it’s not a good situation.”

Pedro Acosta doesn’t ‘care’ about his salary – but that could be bad news for KTM

With the benefit of hindsight, Honda feel it would be ‘useless’ to have a phenomenon like Marquez right now because they don’t have a bike worthy of his talents. They’ve improved this year but are already 75 points adrift of Ducati in the constructors’.

The Ant of Cervera won the last of his six world championships with Honda in 2019 but even he struggled to disguise their decline following his 2020 injury. He was offered an enormous contract extension, but as Luigi Dall’Igna says, ‘money shouldn’t be an issue’ for Marquez.

Likewise, Acosta doesn’t ‘care’ about his salary. On the face of it, that’s good news for KTM, who can’t necessarily compete with the might of a Honda or Yamaha, even in prosperous times.

But in reality, it suggests that his overriding concern is winning, rather than making money. He can’t currently do that at KTM, and VR46 are trying to pounce on Acosta as they reap the benefits of their Ducati partnership.