Bagnaia dominates as Marquez family championship 1-2 is sealed
MotoGP

Bagnaia dominates as Marquez family championship 1-2 is sealed

by Valentin Khorounzhiy
3 min read

Ducati MotoGP rider Pecco Bagnaia won the Malaysian Grand Prix sprint at Sepang to breathe fresh life into his rollercoaster 2025 campaign.

This latest win means that each of Bagnaia’s last nine starts, sprint or grand prix, in MotoGP has been either a win or a non-score - and it puts him back on firmer footing in the fight for third place in the championship against Marco Bezzecchi, with Bagnaia now back ahead by one point there.

Bagnaia, who had powered through from Q1 to pole earlier in the day, led from lights to flag after resisting the mildest hint of an early Alex Marquez challenge.

Marquez, something of a Sepang specialist, ultimately just could not live with Bagnaia's pace. But a second-place finish has officially confirmed him as the MotoGP 2025 runner-up behind brother Marc, who is sitting out the remainder of the campaign through injury.

Rookie Fermin Aldeguer made it a Ducati podium lockout on the road, the champion manufacturer bouncing back in style after a generally disappointing Phillip Island.

However, Aldeguer was placed under a tyre pressure investigation, and duly got an eight-second penalty and lost the podium post-race.

That was despite Aldeguer believing that an issue with the dashboard was the explanation for the potential breach and thinking he could be cleared.

Aldeguer had lost some ground early on - first coming up second-best in a battle with Joan Mir, then getting boxed in behind Franco Morbidelli - but had the best late-race pace of anyone in the field including Bagnaia.

Pedro Acosta spent much of the race in third, even briefly putting pressure on Marquez, but his tyre life limitations on the KTM soon made themselves known.

Mir on the Honda would've been a threat behind - but while chasing after the podium battle he fell off at Turn 9, his crash happening metres ahead of Aldeguer lunging Morbidelli and compromising any chance of Morbidelli's counter-attack on the outside as a result.

Aldeguer then worked his way past a fading Acosta. The penalty relegated him to seventh - behind Acosta, Morbidelli, Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo and Aprilia's Marco Bezzecchi, who scythed his way through the field.

LCR Honda's Johann Zarco and Tech3 KTM's Enea Bastianini bagged eighth and ninth respectively, the final points-paying positions.

They were aided by an incident between Pol Espargaro and Luca Marini up ahead, which was put under shortlived investigation by the stewards but was quickly deemed not worthy of any sanction.

With KTM tester Espargaro also fading for pace late in the race, Marini lunged him at Turn 14 but they came together as they both arrived at the apex, the contact taking Espargaro out of the podium fight and taking Marini down.

It marked Marini's first crash in any MotoGP session this season.

Besides the Honda works riders, Pramac Yamaha's Miguel Oliveira was the only other participant to not finish - having also crashed out, from 18th.

Yamaha's V4 bike wasn't last of the finishers, with tester Augusto Fernandez - 25 seconds back from the winner - fighting off Ducati tester Michele Pirro in what should go down as a relatively encouraging showing.

Results

1 Pecco Bagnaia (Ducati)
2 Alex Marquez (Gresini Ducati) +2.259s
3 Pedro Acosta (KTM) +5.155s
4 Franco Morbidelli (VR46 Ducati) +6.541s
5 Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha) +8.468s
6 Marco Bezzecchi (Aprilia) +10.232s
7 Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini Ducati) +11.138s
8 Johann Zarco (LCR Honda) +12.627s
9 Enea Bastianini (Tech3 KTM) +12.974s
10 Fabio Di Giannantonio (VR46 Ducati) +14.515s
11 Pol Espargaro (Tech3 KTM) +14.924s
12 Ai Ogura (Trackhouse Aprilia) +15.394s
13 Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse Aprilia) +15.461s
14 Jack Miller (Pramac Yamaha) +17.601s
15 Alex Rins (Yamaha) +17.721s
16 Brad Binder (KTM) +18.248s
17 Somkiat Chantra (LCR Honda) +22.398s
18 Lorenzo Savadori (Aprilia) +22.478s
19 Augusto Fernandez (Yamaha) +25.412s
20 Michele Pirro (Ducati) +26.074s
DNF Luca Marini (Honda)
DNF Miguel Oliveira (Pramac Yamaha)
DNF Joan Mir (Honda)

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