Having lined up a season-best seventh on the grid amongst the 23 high-calibre contenders in the sport’s premier class, Bastianini made a solid start to the 25-lap contest – the milestone 40th running of the Andalusian race. 

Swiftly settling into an entertaining three-way tussle for sixth with Pedro Acosta and Raúl Fernández, he showed particularly impressive pace through the final sector of the physical and tortuous 4.42km, 13-turn lap.

After conceding a spot to Fernández, the Italian got the better of Acosta to lead the KTM charge, rapidly pulling away to make seventh position his own. As the race progressed, however, Bastianini found himself under threat from a hard-charging Ai Ogura, with the pair thrilling fans by engaging in a wheel-to-wheel duel before the Japanese rider made his move stick.

Thereafter confidently consolidating eighth position aboard his #23 KTM RC16, ‘La Bestia’ closed the gap to fellow former Moto2 World Champion Johann Zarco to under a second-and-a-half by the chequered flag – in so doing, jumping from 12th to tenth in the World Championship standings.

Next up is Red Bull KTM Tech3’s home event at Le Mans’ Bugatti Circuit – round five of the 22-round campaign and the second stop on the calendar’s European leg on 8-10 May – where the squad hopes to be back to full strength with the return of Maverick Viñales on the sister bike alongside Bastianini. Prior to heading back to France, there is a day of testing at Jerez tomorrow (27 April).

Enea Bastianini: “It’s been a solid weekend from my side. I can be happy, because we were competitive in every session – whether it was cold or hot and also with the wind in today’s race. To be honest, my expectation for the Grand Prix was a bit higher. I was thinking about the top five, but after a few laps, I felt a lot of drop-off from the front tyre so it was impossible to push it from then on. Still, we remained consistent to the end and since Austin, we have taken a good step forward; my main problem during the first two rounds of the season was a lack of all-round grip, but now, it feels much better. Let’s continue in this way!”

Nicolas Goyon, Team Manager: “Enea produced a really strong performance at Jerez. We were looking forward to seeing what he could do after his excellent results in Austin, and it has been another very positive weekend. He had his best qualifying of the season so far – which is so important around this track – and then ran very well in sixth place in the Sprint race until the rain came. We thought maybe we could challenge for the top five in the Grand Prix given how well he manages tyre degradation, but the top guys were just slightly out of reach so eighth and top KTM rider was still a good result. Enea is feeling happier on the bike after a tough start to the year, and climbing into the top ten in the championship will give him even more confidence. Now, it will be really important to maintain this level of performance. The test tomorrow offers us the perfect opportunity to confirm the improvements we have made and set us up well for the rest of the season.”