> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.the-race.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Winners and losers from MotoGP's Aragon sprint - URL: https://www.the-race.com/motogp/winners-and-losers-from-motogps-aragon-sprint/ - Published: 2026-08-29T16:38:46.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-29T16:38:46.000Z - Description: A 2025 throwback Marquez 1-2 in the first Aragon race, but the biggest hero was further back - Author: Valentin Khorounzhiy - Tags: MotoGP, #secondary_feature_1 Marc Marquez has lived up to his status as pre-weekend favourite at Aragon in the sprint, clawing back some much-needed points in the MotoGP title race. With no prizes for guessing which category we're placing him in, here are our winners and losers from MotoGP's Saturday action. ## Winners: The Marquez brothers (1st and 2nd) A callback to 2025 not just in it being a Marc-Alex 1-2 - but in the fact it looked fairly uncomplicated. Once Marc ushered the soft-shod polesitter Marco Bezzecchi to the outside of Turn 1, he was all but assured a straightforward race. His title bid needs 37 points here - and it looks like he will get them. He has already all but promised to repeat the same Turn 1 move on Sunday. On Alex's side, another morsel of evidence that he is a genuine Aragon master - but also a continuation of an increasingly strong season that's not really reflected by the standings. ## Loser: Raul Fernandez (8th) Fernandez doesn't owe anything to Jorge Martin's title bid, but it's probably less than ideal that his race was only notable for roughing up Martin on lap one - before settling into a relatively anonymous ride to eighth. Once a dominant Moto2 winner at Aragon, Fernandez says he hasn't felt comfortable at the track since its resurfacing, and here unlike his fellow Aprilias he didn't fancy the lifespan of the soft rear. Eighth is no disaster but being beaten by a KTM and a Honda is underwhelming. ## Winner: LCR Honda (7th and 9th) Team-mate battles are usually zero-sum games but both Diogo Moreira and Johann Zarco are clearly boosting their value this weekend - and both LCR and Honda, which has both riders under contract beyond 2026, have every reason to be delighted. Zarco really doesn’t look like he’s been out for three months (or even two months, or one month). He led the line for Honda in qualifying and was mixing it in the usual places in the sprint (though he felt a tiny bit of regret in not attacking Fernandez earlier to make his race even better). And Moreira is clearly exceptionally comfortable this weekend, as evidenced not just by his sprint performance but by the fact he decided not to follow other riders in Q1 and advanced by flying solo. ## Loser: Pecco Bagnaia (11th) This was in some ways what we used to expect from Bagnaia in a sprint - in that he only built into the race once it was already all but over. Except it was transposed much further down the grid than we used to see him. The end result, thus, is a finish comfortably outside of the points - and the evaluation is much the same as on Friday - a lack of rear grip. After a mid-season flourish he is firmly in the doldrums again. ## Winner: Jack Miller (10th) The best Yamaha in three of the five comparable sessions so far this weekend, Miller has probably profited at least a little bit from Fabio Quartararo's engine issue (which he'd felt all weekend before it finally gave up the ghost on Saturday). But even accounting for that, Miller’s probably the faster Yamaha rider right now - suddenly soaring in what we now know for sure to be his last half-season in MotoGP. Picking off Zarco at the end would've been the cherry on top here, but even without a point a top-10 looks very nice on paper. ## Loser: Factory Honda (16th and DNF) LCR’s rookie and returnee have relegated Honda's actual factory team duo firmly to the status of afterthought so far this weekend. For what’s supposed to be Honda’s main team, this sprint was effectively over midway through lap one, when Luca Marini slid out of the race - as unlucky collateral in a Miller-Morbidelli-Bastianini incident right ahead of him - three corners after Joan Mir had to pick up his bike and go to last place due to contact through Turn 3 with, again, Enea Bastianini. But even before that it was unlikely to be a particularly productive race for either Mir or Marini, who aren't dreadfully outmatched but aren't on the level of the LCR duo. ## Winner: Pedro Acosta (4th) Acosta managed to fit in a whole slapstick routine in the moments before lights out, though it was hard to see on the broadcast. Seemingly distracted by Alex Marquez right in front of him, he blew past his grid slot, had to hop off his KTM and reverse, then kicked off a seat winglet as he rushed to hop back on. The result was a less-than-compliant bike through the fast right-handers and thus a disappointed Acosta, but you really wouldn't know something was amiss if you compared him to his fellow KTM riders, who he ran rings around again. It seems far-fetched to suggest he could've got much more out of this one. ## Loser: Fabio Di Giannantonio (DNF) Di Giannantonio isn't really winning races this season so his title bid demands extremely dependable points-scoring, with no room for errors - which, however, are increasingly creeping in. This crash from eighth is much less of a problem than the DNF from the grand prix in Germany, as the points blow today is negligible, and within the Ducati camp he clearly does not have an answer to the Marquez brothers at Aragon. But the potential confidence blow isn't well-timed. ## Winner: Fermin Aldeguer (6th) Aldeguer needed to qualify better and probably needed a better first lap - but his pace looks pretty electric this weekend, and he had impressively little trouble working his way through the likes of Bagnaia, Zarco, Fernandez and Moreira. Given his recent injury and given his status as a GP25 rider, this race is another positive signal.