PBM Aprilia's Michael Laverty continues to struggle with a full fuel load at the beginning of MotoGP races but believes his team may have come up with a partial fix to the problem before the next round at Misano.
Because the way his GPMS-framed bike is mass centralised, there is no weight transfer when the tank is full of fuel so he can't get enough load into the front tyre in the early part of races and it is causing the bike to understeer. Cal Crutchlow and Valentino Rossi have both suffered a similar problem this season.
As the fuel goes down, there is more weight transference so he is able to lap faster towards the end of the race. Team technical director Phil Borley is looking at some geometry modifications to the bike so Laverty can get more of his own bodyweight over the front tyre early on.
"There is only one bike like mine in the championship, mine, whereas the FTR boys have five or six crews and riders to share data and feedback, so this makes it a bit tougher," said Laverty, speaking to bikesportnews.com.
"The tank and seat isn't something we can change on the fly and will have to look at it over winter but it isn't like I have been getting slower all season, my gap to the front guys has either been constant or got smaller, it's just the guys who are a little in front of me have been able to up their game.
"We have got some ideas about the front-end geometry to work on at Misano and in the subsequent test - plus I plan to hop on to Yonny's full Aprilia to re-familiarise myself with that and get another look at the direction in which we are heading."