Marco Bezzecchi
KTM ace Brad Binder has returned to the Czech Grand Prix as one of the 12 riders on the 2025 MotoGP grid who hit the track the last time the series visited Brno in 2020.
MotoGP has finally returned to the Automotodrom Brno after five years thanks to the circuit finishing a full resurfacing. The return of the Czech GP to the MotoGP calendar also brings back happy memories for Binder, as he won the 2020 race in his rookie campaign with KTM.
It only took Binder three races to become a premier class Grand Prix winner, but he has only earned one further race victory over his following 99 starts. The 29-year-old is also enduring a largely disappointing season so far this year with Pedro Acosta getting the better of Binder.
Acosta has beaten Binder in every qualifying session since the Spaniard stepped up into the factory KTM team this term. The 21-year-old has also scored 99 points as the top KTM rider to the 69 that Tech3’s Maverick Vinales and 60 that Binder have earned through 11 rounds.
Brad Binder admits KTM’s early strategy for the 2025 MotoGP Czech Grand Prix is ‘strange’
Binder was, however, the only KTM rider to finish the German Grand Prix last Sunday. He hit the chequered flag in P7, after losing out to Honda ace Luca Marini by 0.077 seconds on the run to the finish line. Acosta crashed on Lap 3 of 30 at the Sachsenring while running in P5.
READ MORE: Everything to know about Brad Binder from career stats to wife
Andres Madrid, Binder’s KTM crew chief, even told the South African ahead of the Czech GP that the Austrian team would initially use his base set-up from the German GP in practice at Brno. Binder could only laugh as he told Neil Hodgson about KTM’s ‘strange’ set-up strategy.
Hodgson said on TNT Sports 2: “When I spoke to Brad Binder yesterday, I did my track guide with him, and he laughed.
“He laughed at me and went, ‘A bit strange. I spoke to my crew chief about a starting point for this weekend, and he said we’re sort of going to start with how we left Sachsenring’.
“And he was smiling because obviously two polar opposite race circuits. And he sort of said, ‘I don’t really know how that’s going to work, but that’s basically what we’re going to do’.
“Obviously, it’s not the same gearing. But as far as I can guess, the general geometry of the motorcycle.”
Brad Binder was the slowest KTM rider in the first practice session for the 2025 Czech GP
The differences between the Sachsenring and Brno are night and day, with the home of the German GP a tight track boasting 10 left-hand corners from 13 turns and the Czech GP track much more open and sweeping. Brno also boasts eight right-hand and six left-hand corners.
READ MORE: Everything to know about KTM from the MotoGP team’s riders to hierarchy
Rain also put another hurdle in KTM’s path as the Austrian outfit adapted the base set-up of Binder’s bike from what he used in the German GP last Sunday. The first practice session for the 2025 Czech GP was a wet-dry event, in which Binder only posted the 21st-fastest time.
Trackhouse rookie Ai Ogura was the only rider to lap Brno slower than Binder on Friday, with the Japanese ace posting a 2:11.904 after a heavy crash to the KTM star’s 1:58.830. Ogura’s session was thwarted after a highside on the entry to Turn 3 destroyed his Aprilia RS-GP25.
KTM may at least take some comfort in the early pace that Tech3’s Enea Bastianini set for P5 with a 1:55.598 lap and Acosta managed for P6 with a 1:55.679. Test rider Pol Espargaro also secured P15 with a 1:56.617 as he stands in at Tech3 for the injured Vinales at the Czech GP.
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