Hungarian Grand Prix 2026 MotoGP rider rankings

A big dilemma for the top three order in Val Khorounzhiy's Hungarian Grand Prix MotoGP rider rankings - and unsurprisingly the first corner chaos has a big bearing on the make-up of the bottom places.

Agree or disagree? Leave your thoughts in the comments on this post in The Race Members' Club and Val will reply in his Q&A mini-podcast later this week.

Qualifying: 2nd Sprint: 2nd Grand Prix: 2nd

I hemmed and hawed and changed my mind a dozen times over number one here - and finally had to commit to a choice that I feel slightly worse about but can't convince myself not to make.

Pedro Acosta lost to a physically limited Marc Marquez in all three of the main events of the weekend - Q2, sprint, grand prix - but Marquez did not have the outrageous advantage over his Ducati stablemates that Acosta enjoyed within the KTM ranks.

His fellow KTM riders could not touch him from the first moment of the weekend. But he got spooked right away by Marquez's practice pace on the medium rear and his worries proved correct - despite a bet on the soft and an outrageously spirited defence on Sunday for a handful of corners.

Marquez spent much of the past two weekends talking up his presumed future team-mate and Acosta's difference-making on KTM. Greatness recognises greatness.

Qualifying: 1st Sprint: 1st Grand Prix: 1st

Almost-dominant, and certainly comfortable enough to where you'd hardly know he was physically limited at all.

He seemed to distribute his stamina resource perfectly through the weekend, albeit perhaps slightly overplayed those worries in order to deflect some pressure - as the laptimes never betrayed any signs of fatigue from Marquez in neither the sprint nor the grand prix.

A Turn 1 "rookie mistake" in qualifying that could've been a lot more costly had the bike shut off in that moment (forcing him to sprint for a spare) is handily offset by his injury status and clear buffer over the other Ducatis.

Qualifying: 16th Sprint: 18th Grand Prix: 7th

The biggest compliment I can pay to Iker Lecuona is that this was almost a three-horse race for the first spot.

This was the best he'd looked as a MotoGP rider since, I believe, an eye-catching debut as an injury stand-in for KTM back in 2019 that was followed by two middling full-time seasons.

Recent experience of Balaton Park - P2-P2-P2 in three World Superbikes races, firmly in the middle of his hilarious current streak of 15 consecutive runner-up finishes - clearly helped, but if that was the primary differentiator he would've plateaued after Friday.

He was close to Q2 then, hindered a little by a yellow flag, then had a real shot at Q2 again in Q1 but understandably didn't put the sectors together.

But that top 10-ish pace was there session after session - and after he got stuck in the pack in the sprint due to an overly conservative approach, he pushed on in the main race and finished as high as anyone could've asked.

"For me, it's a 10. Honestly it's a 10," he concluded of his weekend.

Qualifying: 11th Sprint: 7th Grand Prix: 6th

He's unlikely to get to use it much in the future, but Diogo Moreira clearly has an affinity for Balaton Park. This looked like his 'fastest' weekend in MotoGP yet, even if he'd made more of a splash at Mugello.

Friday was good, Q1 a little rough, then the sprint utterly fantastic - set up by a great start and good positioning.

Moreira is proving very capable off the line (though the Honda itself seems to help) and was again effective in this regard on Sunday, but a 'smoother' approach to Turn 1 meant a failure to disengage the start device and the loss of crucial positions.

Being stuck behind Jack Miller afterwards complicated his race, though he was more bothered in hindsight by choosing the medium rear tyre over the soft.

Qualifying: 6th Sprint: 3rd Grand Prix: DNF

Friday looked difficult but the familiar Marco Bezzecchi trick of big in-weekend gains meant it wasn't much of a worry. Indeed, he was firmly in the hunt for a front row in Q2 - but really laboured to put the lap together, which left him "pretty upset with myself".

Turn 1 opened itself up nicely to him in the sprint, enabling him to finish ahead of some nominally-faster rivals. In the grand prix, Turn 1 (which he entered in a close third-to-fifth battle) was obviously not so nice at all.

Qualifying: 7th Sprint: 4th Grand Prix: DNF

Raul Fernandez was worried coming into the weekend but was "comfortable" and "in control" from lap one on Friday.

Bezzecchi seemed to steal a march in the intra-Aprilia fight come qualifying (both ultimately made mistakes that denied them better grid slots), but Fernandez looked in good shape to keep the other RS-GP riders behind him - and did just that in a solid sprint.

He got a really neat start on Sunday and immediately paid for it, as it put him in the path of the Jorge Martin cannonball.

Qualifying: 3rd Sprint: 5th Grand Prix: DNF

Quietly rapid with very little to show for it, Fermin Aldeguer mostly stood out for mistakes in an otherwise processional sprint and getting launched out of the race on Sunday.

He was probably the closest rider to the 'dynamic duo' out front in terms of true performance here, and referenced a "best feeling since the start of the season" - while also largely undisturbed by his long-term leg injury, which was only a minor factor in a couple of corner sections.

There were two simple but major errors in the sprint trying to bite off more than he could chew in a futile sprint chase - and Ducati stablemate Pecco Bagnaia wondered whether Aldeguer tried too hard to cover him off at the start instead of defending from Bezzecchi.

Sunday's start phase looked to have played out a lot better until his race ended at the apex of Turn 1.

Qualifying: 9th Sprint: 12th Grand Prix: 5th

Luca Marini's slightly dejected verdict over his Friday laptime was that it was "impossible to do better than this". But he proceeded to 'do better than this' on Saturday morning, laying the groundwork for a fruitful weekend.

The sprint was a disappointment, a combination of a poor start (he’d "forgot" to do a practice start earlier) and being extra cautious into Turn 1.

But the opportunity presented by Sunday's unfortunate early pile-up was taken well (especially in clearing Miller and building a buffer), even if his favoured soft rear tyre ran out of grip in the end and he was powerless to resist Ai Ogura.

Qualifying: 12th Sprint: 14th Grand Prix: 8th

The fourth-place cameo on Sunday obviously flattered the Yamaha and was never going to last, but even having lost ground gradually Miller ended up nearly quadrupling his points tally for the season.

I couldn't possibly begrudge him this, but the weekend itself was just fairly solid, mostly set up by leading the Yamaha line on Friday (and thus sneaking into Q2) when the new bike seemed, surprisingly, at its most competitive relative to the opposition.

He got pounced on by his Pramac team-mate Toprak Razgatlioglu in the sprint but was on the balance of things the Yamaha standout - just not by anywhere near as much as the timing tower will have led you to believe on Sunday.

Qualifying: 10th Sprint: 11th Grand Prix: 4th

Outside of the five who went down, Ogura was probably the worst-affected by the Turn 1 calamity on Sunday. He did genuinely great work from there, picking his spots and making his moves, despite struggling with the bike in the slipstream - due to the heat impacting the tyre and brakes, and the air disturbance into corners.

But I can't ignore the rest of the weekend in my assessment here. Friday was basically fine but unspectacular, ditto for qualifying on Saturday morning, but the sprint was a disappointment and this was partially self-inflicted - he laboured to find a pocket of space to exploit through the first few corners, but also lost a puzzling amount of ground through Turn 4 and had little chance from then on.

Qualifying: 5th Sprint: 9th Grand Prix: 3rd

Another weekend in which Bagnaia wasn't the best Ducati rider - nor, really, particularly close to second-best - but still got to stand on the main podium, which is a just balancing of the scales when you consider Lady Luck had deserted him for a good few months prior.

A Q2-depriving error on Friday led to flashbacks to his terrible weekend here last year, but Bagnaia got things a bit more together for the rest of the weekend - while appearing consistently aware, maybe too aware, that there's a ceiling of how good he can really be at such a tight, small, slow circuit.

He felt Aldeguer's choice of line into Turn 1 was the main culprit in compromising his sprint (and maybe wasn't wrong, though Aldeguer wasn't necessarily wrong either), then welcomed a "lucky" bit of wheelspin on Sunday that took him out of the Martin firing line - and enabled him to score one of the simplest podiums of his career.

Qualifying: 4th Sprint: 10th Grand Prix: 12th

As Fabio Di Giannantonio pointed out post-race, he was 20 seconds back after lap one and 28 seconds back at the finish - so the evidence is that he would've been in the podium hunt without the crash.

Further evidence to this is the rest of his weekend - when things were going right, he was fast, despite continued irritation at an injured pinky finger.

He was really quick on Friday despite sacrificing a chunk of the day to seemingly fruitless set-up experiments, but had a crash and another botched corner entry in Q2 that messed with his grid position, then laboured on the opening lap of the sprint.

But he'd put himself in a good position on Sunday before being taken out.

Qualifying: 18th Sprint: 13th Grand Prix: 11th

A "very bad" Q1 was the only real blip - and not a huge blip at that, if you look at the gaps - in Razgatlioglu's weekend, but it meant a poor grid position and little chance to make hay in races.

Though he made a settings tweak on Sunday that ended up backfiring and compromising his entry into Turn 5 on the back straight, he felt he had shown marginal top-10 pace in both races if not for being mired in the pack with a bike less-than-conducive to overtaking.

That view was largely supported by looking at the timing screens through the weekend.

Qualifying: 22nd Sprint: 22nd Grand Prix: 16th

Soldiered through in good spirits, with no shortage of enviable one-liners and model enthusiasm despite the apparent muscle tear from Mugello - and without shunting the bike.

Could he have put himself in a position to pick up a point by staying within the requisite 16 seconds of Maverick Vinales on Sunday? It would've been a tall order, but he anyway wasn't to know and isn't here to score points - yet, at least.

Qualifying: 13th Sprint: 15th Grand Prix: DNF

Joan Mir let a good opportunity to score good points - and he sure needs them this year - slip on Sunday, but there is mitigation.

He described the crash that took him out of eighth as "quite strange" and noted that he had been riding with damage including a loose footpeg as a consequence of a clumsy Turn 1 rejoin by Enea Bastianini.

Only he and Honda will have an idea of how much of a role that played in the outcome, but I'm happy to give a bit of grace given he was faultless in the Bastianini incident.

He was, however, quite underwhelming over the rest of the weekend - not helped by some badly-timed loose bodywork already on Friday but then just not particularly fast and a little all-over-the-place in the sprint.

Qualifying: 15th Sprint: 17th Grand Prix: DNF

After two weekends in which he was running laps around his fellow Yamahas, here came two weekends in which Fabio Quartararo looked distinctly ordinary even within the M1 context.

Ignore the grand prix, which looked like racing with a technical failure and was confirmed to be exactly that - and also note that there were technical gremlins here and there earlier in the weekend that held him back.

The Q1 lap was good, though not 'wow', and the sprint underwhelmed.

Qualifying: 14th Sprint: 8th Grand Prix: 9th

Bastianini struggled on Friday but carried confidence into Saturday that he would reach Q2.

This proved misplaced - he didn't maximise the lap - but the underlying performance did seem to tick up substantially through Saturday and Sunday.

But he made his life much harder than it needed to be in the grand prix. Going off at Turn 1 after an earlier shake opened up the brake pads (a familiar KTM malaise), he returned clumsily to collide with Mir and earn a long-lap penalty, then earned another via track-cutting, though did undo some of the damage by picking off Brad Binder at the final corner of the race.

Qualifying: 20th Sprint: 21st Grand Prix: 13th

Perhaps the grid's least noticeable rider this weekend - which can be a byproduct of being in the Yamaha 2026 roster, but in this case also reflected a general lack of performance.

Alex Rins was way too far off his fellow Yamaha riders on Friday, and didn't make enough of a dent in the gap in Q1.

He hobbled to the end in a sprint made pointless by a clutch issue, but believed a genuine step forward was made on Sunday - though ultimately his race was still "very long" and unremarkable.

Qualifying: 21st Sprint: 19th Grand Prix: 15th

Vinales came out of the weekend hoping and believing that he's understood something important about the current KTM - that to ride it you need to brake very late to overload the front, lest it does not stop at all.

And Vinales believes he just doesn't have sufficient power yet to do that, even if he's consistently encouraged about his recovery otherwise.

It's hard to know what to make of it all. He was good-ish on Friday and compromised by yellow flags, but really ineffective in Q1 and pretty much a non-factor in both races.

You really have to wonder whether KTM and Tech3 are seeing enough progress here.

Qualifying: 17th Sprint: 16th Grand Prix: 10th

A curious Mugello pattern continued here: Binder seems a lot better over one lap but it's arrived hand-in-hand with a serious erosion in race pace.

And he didn't put in the peak laptimes here anyway. He crashed in Friday's 'Q0' while trying to chase after the different-league Acosta, then fell in Q1 - racking up his second crash of the weekend before any other MotoGP rider had even crashed once. "I feel really fine, and then all of a sudden it's not," was his explanation of the crash dynamics.

He overshot Turn 1 in the sprint, nearly causing a milder version of the next day's Martin crash - then struggled anyway afterwards, and again on Sunday. He described himself as "just missing pace" and admitted he "thought I'd be a hell of a lot stronger".

Qualifying: 8th Sprint: 6th Grand Prix: DNF

This was a pretty poor Martin weekend already before it took a turn for the really, really poor.

Maximising qualifying continues to elude him on the RS-GP, but this weekend all Aprilia riders struggled to put the best lap together - and even in that context he just wasn't very fast.

He made up for an unusually mediocre start in the sprint by taking an adventurous line into Turn 1 - which perhaps foreshadowed Sunday trouble - before bringing the bike home in a sensible position after just narrowly avoiding a penalty for cutting the track while fighting Moreira.

There was no avoiding the penalty on Sunday as he took four rival frontrunners out of the contest, even if there is sympathy in some circles (though seemingly not so much within Aprilia) over the exact mechanism behind the crash.

Qualifying: 19th Sprint: 20th Grand Prix: 14th

"We need to work together with Ducati to take out a normal grip from the bike," summed up Franco Morbidelli, whose weekend could only be described as humiliating - and whose mission in MotoGP now appears to be to recover a respectable level of pace before he inevitably leaves the grid at the end of the year.

After how the Mugello weekend unfolded he admitted he was "fearing" the prospect of being beaten by stand-in Lecuona here, and in the end Lecuona didn't just beat him but beat him handily in every session but the first.

Morbidelli isn't too forthcoming on what's limiting him so, but it's no mechanical fault nor set-up error. The only way to interpret his messages is that the 2025 Ducati he's riding disagrees with him at a truly fundamental level.