Smith, Aprilia to test at Misano

Following KTM's recent private test at the Red Bull Ring, Aprilia will hold its first MotoGP outing since the coronavirus lockdown on June 10-11 at Misano.

Crash.net has been told that factory test rider Bradley Smith will be present for the initial outing, described mainly as a shakedown,while a further test at the end of June will see Smith joined by race rider Aleix Espargaro.

Team-mate Andrea Iannone is still awaiting the outcome of his appeal to the CAS against an 18-month ban for failing a doping test at the Malaysian Grand Prix, with Smith set to take the Italian's place if he is unable to race this season.

Aprilia's all-new RS-GP made an impressive debut at the Sepang and Qatar tests, albeit with some engine reliability concerns.

But those worries became magnified when MotoGP's new cost-cutting technical freeze on engine and aerodynamic development was announced since it would have immediately stopped Concession teams Aprilia and KTM from continuing their normal development, thus preventing Aprilia fixing the reliability issues.

Fortunately for Aprilia, the Grand Prix Commission recently announced that the final 2020 engine design for the Concession manufacturers will now be frozen at the end of June, rather than in March 'Qatar spec', as was the case for Honda, Ducati, Yamaha and Suzuki.

The MotoGP Concessions package (for factories without multiple podium finishes in recent seasons) includes the right to test at any circuit, with race riders, as long as it's not within 14-days of a GP event to be held at the same track.

Race riders from non-Concession manufacturers are not expected to ride their grand prix machines until a test day on the Wednesday prior to the proposed Jerez season opener, in mid-July.