The Indonesian round of the MotoGP championship provided some unusual results.
Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi was the fastest rider all weekend, taking pole position and winning Saturday’s Sprint. On Sunday, however, he crashed on the opening lap causing newly crowned champion Marc Marquez to go down. Bezzecchi was largely unhurt, but Marc injured his shoulder and is expected to miss at least the next two rounds of racing.
On Saturday, Bezzecchi was followed home by Fermin Aldeguer (Ducati) in second place and Raul Fernandez (Aprilia) in third. Bezzecchi recovered from a poor start to pass Aldeguer on the final lap for the win.
On Sunday, Aldeguer romped to a dominant win with a near 10 second lead over second place late in the race. Behind him, Pedro Acosta (KTM) finished second and Alex Marquez (Ducati) third.
For full results and points for Saturday’s Sprint race, visit the MotoGP site here. For full results and points for Sunday’s MotoGP race, visit the MotoGP site here.
All will be revealed after the great reset- 2027 season when all teams are starting from scratch and much of the ridiculous aero crap and electronic nannies are gone. Shame that they’ll likely be the same or slower the WSBK on some tracks. Still looking forward to what hopefully should be a more level playing field.
2027 will not be a “great reset”. The teams will continue to earn finishes commensurate with their investments.
Aero will hardly change. Things will just be a little narrower. There are also almost no electronics changes to my understanding. These aren’t “nannies”. Riders don’t ask for safety, they ask for performance. These things only make them faster. They still crash. A lot.
Active ride height devices will go away. That’ll be wash.
They will still be faster than WSBK. They may not be appreciably slower at all. They didn’t get slower the last time they cut 200cc out of them. They are already grossly overpowered, hence the need for electronics to help riders get the most out of the engine and tires.
I hope you’re right for most of it. Shame about the aero though as Ducati’s involvement with Ferrari and its wind tunnels is what’s give them a leg up already.
As for the rest, I just hope it makes for better overall racing.
I think anyone expecting a major change is going to be disappointed. Same bunch of guys riding aero fetooned four strokes with every rider aid known to man, except the ride height bit.
Is BMW still making noises about joining the party? That would change things a little. But it won’t unbreak the system they destroyed in 2002. Sport bikes will never regain the popularity they enjoyed before that year of infamy.
It should make for even closer racing, though it’s easy to forget that it’s been closer than it ever was for the past 5 or so years. I remember when lapping riders was a consistent problem. Wasn’t that long ago. Glad those days are gone.
The very aids that help them go fast also limit just how fast. You don’t see anyone sliding it all over the place like Stoner anymore because the aids won’t allow that sort of thing. All the lap times are close because the electronics say so.
Back when there was lap traffic the bikes were organic and much cheaper. The grids were twice the size as a result. I watched a race from 1989 yesterday. Huge grid.
No Mick, the technologies they use to not in any limit how fast they go. There is no downsides to these things. They are completely adjustable. A rider can choose how much or little intervention that results in the best performance for their style. Stoner had all of these aids and his wonderful sliding style was possible in part, because of them. You don’t see riders sliding around because it’s slower and trashes tires faster. Can’t win like this anymore.
There has never been a time when GP racing was cheap. Honda would lease teams an NSR 500 with limited factory support, no suspension, wheels, or brakes for $1m/year.
funny how immediately after MM was crashed off the track by Bezzi, and while knowing something was broke in his shoulder possibly ending his season, MM still shook Bezzi’s hand trackside and then told race fans to not harass Bezzi as what happened was an accident and a part of racing.
-funny how a certain other well known ex-racer has-been, who purposely crashed MM out and tried several to do the same other times, refused to shake MM’s hand is still lamenting an incident from 2015. very classy.
anhoo, Dave…it’s all yours.
I’ve seen the light of Mick.
MM is the worst rider in history and should be in jail for all his dirty tricks.
Ducati wasted millions of dollars on Pecco because Mick doesn’t like Pecco’s hair style.
It’s obvious.
marc marquez is a current MotoGP rider who dominated MotoGP before all of the aero and other gadgets were added on.
why would anyone think that that MM, who absolutely embarrassed the rest of the MotoGp field in 2025 on a bike with all the latest and best add-ons, will not excel on the new old 2027 bikes?
the hype of 2025 is that marc marquez is besting Pecco because mm has/had the much better ability to adapt to the 2025 bike. if that is true and accurate then the only way 2027 is not going to be another marc marquez show is if marc marques does not to race in 2027.
if mm races in 2027 he will be adapting (more like re-acquainting himself) to an old friend.
marc marquez is a current MotoGP rider who dominated MotoGP before all of the aero and other gadgets were added on.
why would anyone think that that MM, who absolutely embarrassed the rest of the MotoGp field in 2025 on a bike with all the latest and best add-ons, will not excel on the new old 2027 bikes?
the hype of 2025 is that marc marquez is besting Pecco because mm has/had the much better ability to adapt to the 2025 bike. if that is true and accurate then the only way 2027 is not going to be another marc marquez show is if marc marques does not to race in 2027.
if mm races in 2027 he will be adapting (more like re-acquainting himself) to an old friend, i’d think.
Fermin was good in Moto2. So we got. Besides, Pedro is also good.
so last week mm#93 sandbags it for two 2nd places, clinches the title nearly two months early, and then on the first race lap, gets penalized for rough riding. if he had ridden this season in shorts and an open face, safely taking second, he would have more points than he does now.
Apparently they have been racing on this track for four years and Marquez has crashed out of every main event there. I think leathers are the appropriate mufti for this track.
It’s clear that the GP25 is not the bike for this track. It looks like the GP24 and GP23 were better bikes in general. You kind of wonder if the teams running the GP24s would rather keep them than run the 25s next year. Marquez can ride it, except at this track, but the other two guys don’t seem very happy with it.
I wonder what next years bike will be like. Are they going to admit that they were chasing a dumb idea? Or are they going to double down on it because they feel that the didn’t chase the dumb idea hard enough. Dig Bagnaia at the sprint. Dead last by 12 seconds. The team is clearly sending him a message. He should go to Aprilia. Life is too short to waste on playing silly games.
What is the “dumb idea”? According to the points, only Alex Marquez is really competitive with the 25’s on a 24. There’s always going to be an anomaly track here & there, though.
Bagnaia hasn’t had the year he wanted but he’s still in 3rd place overall.
I don’t know what the “dumb idea” is. But I reserve the right to feel that they have one. And rather than put their heads down and make sure Bagnaia has a Ducati worthy of the name on the tank. They only did so once all year. Boil that down all all you want. It’s still going to stink. He was dead last by 12 seconds on the very next race and crashed out of the one after that. They sent a champion out on garbage. I’ve bought six Ducatis. I will never buy another one except for my wife. That’s her deal. Don’t ever think that I’m not serious about that. You just don’t treat racers that way on my watch.
why do assume your level of seriousness regarding purchasing a Ducati is of any consequence to anyone here?
a Ducati sits; first, second, third, sixth, seventh, and, eighth in 2025.
yep…darn Ducati and their garbage race bikes…I’ll never buy one too. I won’t even buy a single one for my wife. I’m serious.
You do have the right to feel that way but its a peculiar way to feel about the factory that continues to field the dominant bike in the series. The fact is, they gave the same bike to Bagnaia as Marquez and the latter’s people got his working for him and the former’s didn’t. The idea that Bagnaia was “mistreated” is silly. Racing is a marketing exercise. Nobody would spend millions of euro’s making themselves look bad. That just doesn’t happen.
Wow. That’s AI level add copy. Software has yet to exceed wetware. People have this habit of being born with this thing in their head, any a VERY impressive sensor suite, that is far beyond anything the admittedly clever things the meat puppets are currently able to fashion. You might think that you want Marquez to father your children because he is so fast. But wait a sec. Didn’t Stoner take a bike that nobody could ride and make the front end stick by sliding the rear? Stoner was winning on want was basically the Hondas that Marquez was doing nothing but crashing on. Maybe Marquez could have done the same thing. But didn’t you sit and watch Marquez doing worse and worse as the electronics got more and more sophisticated?
Ducati was quite successful in the recent past because they took all of their riders feedback very seriously. Do you really think that was all about chassis and suspension settings? No sir. They were dialing in the nanny settings and getting them better at letting the riders ride without the nannies getting in the way whenever they want to use a dirt track or ice racing trick. Honda always had an attitude about their bikes being perfect and the riders job was to ride them perfectly. They have always been quick to buy the best riders. They had a lot of success doing that. I’m sure that right up until Marquez left they were certain that they had a perfect nanny suite. Did they? Marquez has a knack for saving himself from crashing. You do that by doing things by instinct. But you can’t do things like that if the really sophisticated IMU insists that those things aren’t possible. So Marquez crashed and crashed and crashed because his perfect nannies didn’t let him do the “crazy” things that got him by. So he went to Ducati where they were teaching their nannies when to sit still, clutch their pearls, and watch the wetware do its thing. This year you can see that the other teams are catching on. So they aren’t all riding behind a big red wave.
People talk about what a great TV show these races are now that the nannies have everyone riding about the same pace. They do that by making everyone inhabit the fat part of the bell curve. You can kid yourself that it makes them all faster. Just don’t ever try to sell me on that idea. You don’t see any nannies on an observed trials bike do you? Imagine Honda telling Toni Bou that they have this electronics suite that’s going to really help him dominate. Yeah right. There’s Toni heading for the door.
The fact is they gave Bagnaia a decent bike for one race day, proving that they can do it. In the next sprint he finished dead last with a 12 second gap behind the guy in front of him. He crashed out of the main, like Marquez often did while trying to wring out those Hondas he was riding. Bagnaia should have just taken his gear off and gone home when he found that they were putting him on a repainted Vespa. Why risk getting hurt?
Ducati was fielding a dominant bike. Now they are fielding a dominant rider. They are not filling the top five spots anymore. There are new guys running the circus. It’s clear that they was a bit more of a variety show. So Ducati is winning. They are no longer dominating.
Stoner the Ducati hero. Wrong.
if you paid attention you’d know that MotoGp had to create a rule due to the other teams’ complaints of the unfair practices of Ducati specifically regarding Stoner.
The reason Stoner was magically and unexplainably the only person able to ride the Ducati back in the day was not magic and not due to Stoner’s supreme skill…it was simply Ducati’s parent company’s deep pockets filled with money enough to give Stoner an unfair advantage over the other racers.
Ducati parents bought and paid for a lot of test sessions with Stoner. A lot.
a lot more than other teams had the opportunity to have.
Ducati developed Stoner along with the bike through many, many, test sessions before the official rule barring such activities was put forth.
Everyone says Stoner retired in his prime with many years left in career had he wanted. I believe it.
It is ‘funny’ though how Stoner retired the year Marquez joined the party.
I wonder why? Not.
I’d guess Stoner was watching MM for a while and knew for sure that his own ‘magic hero’ status was going straight down the toilet the same everyone else’s. I’d guess his only option was to retire so he didn’t have to directly compete with MM and could then live off his reputation.
Nobody is “kidding themselves” that the newer technology is making them faster, the stopwatch and history clearly proves that they are faster. Bezzechi just broke the all time lap record ad Philip Island, Australia (withou dirt-tracking the turns..). Likewise, we aren’t kidding ourselves that Ducati fields the dominant bike, the scoreboard clearly proves that they are.
As for how Stoner, Marquez or anyone else does it, you have no idea how hey did it. You don’t even watch MotoGP, remember? If you ever read Inteviews with Casey Stoner you’d know he battled with crippling anxiety. He was literally terrified during a lot of his GP career. His retirement had nothing to do with Marquez. He probably was barely aware of his presence.
regarding Stoner’s retirement;
I remember Stoner first episodes of missing work due to a mystery illness.
I remember after more and more work was missed that the mystery illness was then identified as a mysterious stomach issue.
Crippling anxiety.
I sure do believe that people suffer from anxiety and Casey surely could have too.
Slight difference though.
We are talking about a multimillion dollar athlete on a billion dollar sports team.
I have to think that a multimillionaire highly public famous athlete has unimaginable (to most) top level resources available to effectively deal with anxiety issues.
I have to think Stoner retired because he wanted to (fame and wealth achieved) due to loss of motivation to continue and not because he had to due to unresolved mental health issues.
I remember years ago before mm joined motogp, numerous top motogp racers knew of him and stated when he comes he will be very successful.
I remember the exact same thing being said by mm about Pedro Acosta years ago.
These guys know all about the up and coming “competition” long before they arrive.
It’s literally their business.
“But didn’t you sit and watch Marquez doing worse and worse as the electronics got more and more sophisticated?”
did you see that?
I didn’t.
I saw MM’s results becoming worse and worse as the other team’s bikes (electronics/aeros/chassis/suspensions etc., etc..) became better while Honda’s bikes became a laughing stock of MotoGp.
You didn’t see that?
before he left Honda Marquez was quoted saying that he is still the fastest guy on the track but he can only perform miracles so often and not throughout the entire race.
Considering his 2024 and 2025 results in MotoGP, I believe him.
both Martin and Pecco knew, in 2024, that 2024 was their last time to be in the spot light. The game was over.
Pecco flat out admitted it saying, near the end of 2024 before the title was decided, that whatever happens in 2024 (if he retained the title) doesn’t matter because 2025 is when the truth will arrive…the truth being competing against Marquez on a top bike.
Pecco got his answer very early in 2025, and crumbled, while Martin crumbled long before that by leaving the most competitive bike so he didn’t have to even try to compete against MM and lose like he knew he would. Martin thought his leaving Ducati was him saving face. No.
Most interesting results in years. Kudos to the track designers!