A week on from the title lead swinging from Bagnaia to Pramac’s Martin and back to Bagnaia at the Indonesian GP, 18 points splits to the pair coming to Phillip Island.
Bagnaia lost his championship lead after struggling to 13th in qualifying at Mandalika and recovered only to eighth in the sprint, while Martin won.
And while he retook the lead by 18 points with the Sunday win after Martin crashed, Bagnaia once again faces a Q1 battle after ending Friday practice at Phillip Island outside of the crucial top 10 places.
Bagnaia, just as he did in Indonesia, struggled for pace on softer rubber, especially with traction – which led to a 0.2s difference between himself and fourth-placed Martin in the last corner alone.
“We started with the medium rear and everything was great, the pace was one of the best with this spec,” Bagnaia, who was over fourth tenths slower than Martin on Friday in Australia, said.
“But when we put on the soft rear for the time attack, I started having problems.
“Maybe the best strategy was to start on the soft like almost all the other riders, to analyse the reaction of the soft.
