Marco Bezzecchi
Pedro Acosta just put another one of the best performances of his MotoGP career at the Malaysian Grand Prix to take home second for KTM.
He ends the flyaways on a positive note, and might sense an outside opportunity to finish third in the MotoGP standings on current form. Acosta’s aggressive soft tyre strategy paid off in the end, and left him just a few seconds behind race-winner Alex Marquez.
The Spaniard was one of the few bright sparks of the race, as he battled Francesco Bagnaia for quite some time. His KTM’s straight-line speed came in handy, and by the middle part of the race, he was starting to be held up by the Ducati rider.
Bagnaia suffered a late problem and was forced to retire from a potential spot on the podium with just a handful of laps to go. Acosta knows what he’s missing at KTM, and yet again today, he needed just that little bit more to earn a breakthrough maiden victory.
READ MORE: Pedro Acosta says whether he would ‘trade’ places with Francesco Bagnaia at Ducati
Pedro Acosta surprised Michael Laverty by pulling a gap on Francesco Bagnaia at the Malaysian Grand Prix
KTM must deliver the bike Acosta wants if they want to stand a chance of keeping him beyond the end of his current contract, which runs until the end of 2026. Ahead of the new regulations in 2027, there will be plenty of teams sniffing around him.
Despite having two riders already, Ducati are looking at Acosta as a potential replacement for Bagnaia, should he continue to struggle with inconsistencies. His performances are one of the hardest things to predict in the championship this year.
After winning the sprint on Saturday, he was unable to replicate the same sort of form on Sunday, and Acosta was able to ease past him in the end. The gap he built on Bagnaia ended up leaving TNT Sports’ Michael Laverty a bit surprised in the end, as the KTM usually falls off a cliff at the end of races.
“Pedro finally uses the exceptional turn-in of the KTM, he just gets it turned a little bit tighter into [turn] 11, sets it up into 12,” he said.
“This is it, he finally gets it done and is able to put down a few clean laps. He actually pulled a comfortable margin on Pecco, which I didn’t expect.”
READ MORE: Pedro Acosta’s stance on signing a new contract after KTM refused his seven-figure buy-out offer
Has Pedro Acosta been the most impressive MotoGP rider since the summer break?
After an underwhelming start to the season, where it looked as though Acosta was struggling to get to grips with the demands of being in a factory MotoGP team, he has recovered well.
It took him 12 races to earn his first podium in 2025, but since then, he has returned to the top three on three more occasions in Grands Prix, finishing second each time.
He’s knocking on the door of a first win, and if Marco Bezzecchi on the Aprilia has a nightmare over the final two races, the fight for third in the standings could be wide open.
Honda are ready to triple Acosta’s salary, and that says everything that is needed to be known about his performances. There’s definitely an argument to suggest that he has been the most impressive rider since the summer break.
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