Marc Marquez, Ducati Team
Marc Marquez claimed his sixth sprint win of the 2026 MotoGP season at the San Marino Grand Prix to close the gap to Jorge Martin in the championship.
The Ducati star passed polesitter Marco Bezzecchi at the start of the 13-lap contest and resisted a late challenge from his Aprilia rival to take the chequered flag by 1.068s.
Martin completed the podium spots in third place aboard the other Aprilia, but couldn’t challenge the leading duo.
At the start of the race, Marquez got the holeshot from second on the grid, passing polesitter Bezzecchi into Turn 1 in a repeat of the Aragon sprint last time out.
Meanwhile, Fabio di Giannantonio barged past front-row starter Fermin Aldeguer at Turn 4, allowing Martin to also come through and grab fourth.
Bezzecchi initially matched Marquez’s pace on his soft-shod Aprilia, but the Ducati rider quickly began to pull away, building an advantage of a second by lap five.
After the mid-point of the race, Bezzecchi started eating into Marquez’s lead, slashing the gap by half on lap eight.
Track action
Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / Getty Images
However, the reigning world champion responded to his pace soon after, setting the fastest lap of the race to extend the gap back up to 0.8s.
The two remained closely-matched over the final two tours, but Marquez held on to cement his status as MotoGP’s best-performing rider on Saturdays.
Behind the leading duo, Martin claimed the final spot on the podium in third, passing di Giannantonio on lap seven before pulling clear of the VR46 rider.
Alex Marquez took advantage of a close tussle between Pedro Acosta and Aldeguer to claim fifth, recovering from a difficult qualifying session in which he crashed twice.
Acosta had to settle for sixth aboard the factory KTM, ahead of Trackhouse’s Raul Fernandez and Aldeguer, the latter recovering to eighth after dropping to as low as 10th.
The final championship point went to Honda rider Luca Marini, who survived a mid-race collision triggered by Fabio Quartararo’s Yamaha to take ninth place on home turf.
Johann Zarco completed the top 10 for LCR.
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- The Autosport.com Team
Source: Autosport