MotoGP 2025: Marquez dominates opener

The MotoGP World Championship roared back into life last weekend with round one taking place at the Buriram circuit in Thailand and if was the perfect start in life as a factory rider for Marc Marquez as he dominated proceedings.

Marquez masterclass

Ever since the factory Ducati team signed eight-time World Champion Marc Marquez mid-way through last season, excitement and anticipation has been building as to what exactly he can do on the all-conquering Panigale. And if the season opener is anything to go by, the Spaniard is going to have a more than enjoyable year.

Marquez had a solid but unspectacular pre-season, keeping his powder dry on track and saying all the right things off it. Deep down, he’ll know already what he can achieve but he’s been fully respectful of team-mate Francesco Bagnaia, recognising the Italian’s strong points and how and where he can learn from the Italian whose knowledge of the Ducati is vast, taking the title twice in the last three seasons.

Marc Marquez Image Credit Ducati Racing

Buriram showed that Marquez is a quick learner, marrying some of Bagnaia’s strengths on the Ducati with the large amount of his own he already he has, gleaned from all his record-breaking years at Honda plus the single season last year on the year-old Ducati. In Thailand he was back to his brilliant best, taking pole position and the victories in both the Sprint and feature races.

It was the dream start and one that will have alarm bells ringing across the rest of the grid if they weren’t ringing already. The first rider to win on his Ducati debut since Casey Stoner in 2007, all the ingredients are there for Marquez to win a seventh MotoGP title and although it’s the longest season in the history of the series – 22 rounds in total – he’s already done enough to show what a formidable rival he’ll be in 2025.

And with the next two rounds being at two of his favourite circuits, he could quickly build up a healthy lead in the standings – the opposition will need to up their game.

Sibling success

Whilst Marquez claimed the top spot in each race, brother Alex enjoyed the most productive weekend of his Moto GP career with second in qualifying and a brace of second place finishes in the two races.

Alex Marquez Image Credit Gresini Racing

Moving onto the GP24-model machine has clearly been of benefit to the younger of the Marquez siblings and although he’d been quick throughout pre-season testing, topping several sessions, many were unsure if he’d bring that form to a race weekend.

He did more than that though and was not only fast, but assured and confident with it, looking extremely comfortable when leading. The 28-year old is now in his sixth MotoGP season and third with Ducati with 2025 seeing as team leader for the first time. Clearly at home with Gresini Racing, now’s the time to start delivering the results of Buriram on a regular basis.

Food for thought for Bagnaia

With the Marquez brothers taking the top spots, 2022 and 2023 World Champion Bagnaia had to settle for third spot in both the Feature and Sprint races, seemingly unable to offer any form of major challenge albeit only 3.4s and 2.3s adrift respectively at the chequered flag.

The pending arrival of Marc Marquez in the garage would have got his attention when the announcement was made and now it’s reality, that will only have increased.

Bagnaia Image Credit Ducati Racing

As team-mates, they both have 100% access to each other’s data, so Bagnaia gets to see first hand exactly what Marquez is doing particularly through left hand corners where he’s the clear master dominating at circuits where these are prevalent.

The two team-mates have been extremely cordial with each other so far, both demonstrating the utmost respect for each other, but whilst it’s only round once, Bagnaia will certainly have some food for thought after the first month of the 2025 season. He, understandably, looked downcast after race two at Buriram, but having Marquez as team-mate will make him a better rider so let’s see how he responds at round two.

Superb Ogura

Marc Marquez and Ducati in general may have dominated the weekend, with the top four positions in the early season championship standings, but as much as the Spaniard was lauded for his performances, there was equal praise for class rookie Ai Ogura.

The Japanese was comfortably the leading debutante at round one, taking fourth and fifth in the two races to pick up 17 points and slot into fifth in the championship table behind the Marquez brothers, Bagnaia and Franco Morbidelli. To put that into context, the next best rookie was Fermin Aldeguer who scored three points for 13th in the feature race.

Ai Ogura Image Credit Trackhouse Racing

Ogura was also the best Aprilia rider, by some distance, the Trackhouse Racing rider not only comfortably outperforming more experienced team-mate Raul Fernandez but also Marco Bezzecchi on the official factory machine.

Of course, Ogura is the reigning Moto2 World Champion so perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised. But there was nothing really in pre-season to indicate these kind of performance levels. He would have learned greatly in the two races as well, particularly when latched onto the back wheel of Bagnaia, so he should only get stronger, a huge boost to Aprilia who remain without their number one rider, World Champion Jorge Martin.

Huge blow

Martin’s absence was a huge blow for everyone – the rider himself, obviously, but also Aprilia and the MotoGP World Championship as a whole. The last time the reigning champion was missing from the opening race was 1984 when Freddie Spencer’s carbon fibre wheel collapsed in practice at Kyalami for that year’s South African GP, torn foot ligaments and bruising ruling the American out.

Martin’s start to the defence of his title couldn’t have got off to a worse start. A heavy crash on the opening day of pre-season testing on 5th February left him with fractures to his right hand and left foot and although surgery on his wrist was successful, a training accident at the beginning of race week left him injured again.

MotoGP Racing Returns Image Credit Honda Race Corporation

It was the first time he’d been back on a bike since the original crash and this time the outcome was a complex fracture of the radius and some carpal bones on the left side, not only ruling him out of the season opener but also round two in Argentina on 14-16 March.

The third round takes place two weeks after that in the USA so Martin will be hoping to return there but even if he does, it’s going to be an uphill struggle having had no time on the bike and with everyone else fully up to speed. The possibility of a second MotoGP has all but gone already.

Progress for Honda

Whilst Aprilia were lamenting Martin’s absence, there was plenty for Honda to be happy about as they got their 2025 campaign off to a promising start with three top ten finishes across the two races. Indeed, Joan Mir has never looked stronger on the RCV213V.

True, the 2020 World Champion crashed out of the feature race when another strong finish looked on the cards but after posting the sixth fastest time in practice, he had good reason to smile having languished at the opposite end of the results sheets these last two years.

Joan Mir Image Credit Honda Race Corporation

It’s been a tough few years in MotoGP for the Japanese giant but Mir’s showing – coupled with pre-season testing results – showed that there could be light at the end of the tunnel. That statement was more than backed up by Johann Zarco who ended the weekend as the best Honda performer with tenth in the Sprint race and an even better seventh in the main race.

Having employed retired MotoGP racers Aleix Espargaro and Takaaki Nakagami as test riders, it’s clear they’ve made huge steps in the right direction with development of the bike giving Mir, Zarco and Luca Marini a bike they can race competitively with. The next step is to score consistent top ten finishes and then start to aim for the top six.

KTM struggles

It’s been a chastening few months for KTM, with their financial difficulties well-publicised and still being far from resolved. Those talks continue at pace with recovery programmes still to be finalised and/or agreed and although their MotoGP operation is continuing, seemingly unaffected, the reality is that it’s bound to have had an effect.

And Thailand showed they’ve got work to do to get back at the sharp end. A brace of eighths for Brad Binder was the best they had to show for their overall efforts and although the prodigious Pedro Acosta took sixth in the Sprint race, that was offset by a crash and zero points in the feature encounter. More worryingly were the gaps to the leaders, some 20s on Sunday.

Brad Binder Image Credit KTM Press Center

And it was worse for new signings Enea Bastianini and Maverick Vinales. The latter, bidding this season to become the first rider to win a MotoGP for four different manufacturers, left round one pointless whilst his Italian team-mate was down in 18th in the Sprint race, almost 30s slower than what he had been on the Ducati the year before.

However, there were shoots of recovery the following day when he claimed a solid ninth and if that directional change in set-up continues, maybe they can all make a better impression in Argentina.

Having started watching motorcycle races all over the world form childhood, Phil Wain has been a freelance motorcycle journalist for almost 20 years and is features writer for a number of publications including BikeSport News, Classic Racer and Road Racing Ireland, as well as being a regular contributor to MCN and MCN Sport.

He is PR officer for a number of teams and riders at both the British Superbike Championship and International road races, including PBM Ducati, John McGuinness, KTS Racing and Jackson Racing. He is also heavily involved with the Isle of Man TT Races working with the race organisation, writing official press releases and race reports as well as providing the TV and radio broadcasting teams with statistical information.