Marquez wins Qatar GP sprint as Bagnaia struggles again

Marc Marquez reclaimed the MotoGP 2025 championship lead by defeating brother Alex in the Qatar Grand Prix sprint, as Pecco Bagnaia toiled to a subpar result.

It marked the sixth Marquez 1-2 of the season, in that same order, as they are now two points apart at the top of the standings.

They had started in that same order, but Alex was briefly challenged by Yamaha's Fabio Quartararo off the line, ultimately seeing him off on the brakes.

That then set up an attack on his brother at the start of the second lap, but Alex just couldn't keep the line tight enough on the inside of Turn 1 and gave Marc the position back.

It opened the door for the elder Marquez to control the race, which he wound up duly winning by 1.6s seconds.

VR46 rider Franco Morbidelli briefly threatened to challenge the Marquez monopoly after clearing Quartararo for third at the start of the second lap, but quickly dropped back, and ended up more preoccupied with keeping Quartararo at a safe distance for that final podium spot.

And on the final lap he was suddenly under massive pressure - not only from Quartararo but from rookie Fermin Aldeguer, the fastest rider on track in the final laps, and his VR46 team-mate Fabio Di Giannantonio.

In the end, Quartararo nearly went down in the final corner as he chased after Morbidelli, his error allowing Aldeguer through into a career-best fourth, with Di Giannantonio behind them in sixth.

Ai Ogura was the shining light for Aprilia yet again, the Trackhouse rookie bagging a seventh place.

It was a muted ride from Bagnaia, who made little progress from 11th on the grid early on and even slipped back to as low as 12th - though the tyre strategies in the race did enable him to rescue a handful of points.

Helping him was the fact that several riders ahead of him were running the soft rear (as opposed to the medium rear favoured by all the frontrunners), and all of them faded terribly.

Maverick Vinales and Pedro Acosta both ran the soft rear - surprisingly, given this year's KTM is a bit of a notorious tyre-chewer - and while Vinales ran as high as fifth, both faded comfortably out of the points by the end.

So did LCR Honda rider Johann Zarco, who ended up parking it in the pits after dropping out of the top 10.

So it was Bagnaia and his good friend Marco Bezzecchi (Aprilia) completing the points-scoring top nine, with Bagnaia coming up a tenth short of picking off Ogura.

It means he now trails Marc Marquez by 21 points in the standings.

The returning Jorge Martin had a combative first race in 2025, the reigning champion running as high as 11th early on - and even going ahead of Bagnaia - before fading to 16th in the end.