Gresini rider Alex Marquez claimed a commanding victory in the final sprint of the 2025 MotoGP season at the Valencia Grand Prix, as polesitter Marco Bezzecchi struggled to fifth.
Marquez seized the lead from Bezzecchi at the start and held off an early charge from KTM rival Pedro Acosta to score his second consecutive sprint win, and the third of the campaign.
Acosta couldn’t keep up with Marquez in the second half of the race, but bagged yet another podium finish in second, with Fabio di Giannantonio finishing third.
At lights out, Bezzecchi got a poor launch from pole position, allowing Marquez to grab the lead into Turn 1 and Acosta to snatch second from him at the following corner.
The Aprilia rider continued to tumble down the order on the soft front tyre, settling into sixth behind the Yamaha of Fabio Quartararo at the end of the opening lap.
This allowed Marquez and Acosta to run away at the front, but there was no repeat of their epic duel from Portimao, with the former pulling out a lead of over a second by lap 6 of 12.
The 29-year-old eventually cruised to the chequered flag by 1.1s, as his world champion brother Marc Marquez watched on from the pits after returning to the paddock for the first time since his Indonesia crash. Acosta took the chequered flag in second place, leapfrogging his Ducati counterpart Francesco Bagnaia to fourth place in the riders’ standings.
Meanwhile, VR46’s di Giannantonio grabbed the final spot on the podium in third, passing Raul Fernandez at Turn 6 with just three laps to run after a race-long battle with the Trackhouse rider. Fernandez also came under pressure from a recovering Bezzecchi in the final lap of the race, but held on to finish as the top Aprilia in fourth.
Franco Morbidelli ended up sixth for VR46, while Quartararo slipped to seventh after losing places to both Bezzecchi and Morbidelli late on. A rapid opening lap allowed Brad Binder to finish eighth, having started 15th, while the championship point went to Trackhouse rookie Ai Ogura.
Honda failed to score a single point in the sprint after Joan Mir lost the front of his factory RC213V on lap two and took his team-mate Luca Marini along with him. The Japanese marque’s best finisher was LCR rider Johann Zarco in 10th.
Jorge Martin ran as high as 11th in the early stages on his comeback, but dropped to 22nd and last after he ran wide on lap 4 while trying to avoid Zarco.
Fermin Aldeguer and Jack Miller came together on lap three, an incident for which the Pramac rider was told to drop three positions. But after failing to serve the penalty in the required period, he was issued a long-lap penalty, which left him 12th - one spot behind Aldeguer.
Two-time MotoGP champion Francesco Bagnaia had a tough race en route to 14th, two places ahead of team-mate and Marc Marquez’s stand-in, Nicolo Bulega.
MotoGP Valencia GP sprint results
SPRINT
| Cla | Rider | # | Bike | Laps | Time | Interval | km/h | Retirement | Points | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  A. Marquez Gresini Racing |
73 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
19'37.490 |
159.1 | 12 | |||||
| 2 | P. Acosta Red Bull KTM Factory Racing |
37 |  |
KTM | 13 |
+1.149 19'38.639 |
1.149 | 159.0 | 9 | ||||
| 3 |  F. Di Giannantonio Team VR46 |
49 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
+2.637 19'40.127 |
1.488 | 158.8 | 7 | ||||
| 4 | R. Fernández Trackhouse Racing Team |
25 |  |
Aprilia | 13 |
+3.519 19'41.009 |
0.882 | 158.7 | 6 | ||||
| 5 | M. Bezzecchi Aprilia Racing Team |
72 |  |
Aprilia | 13 |
+3.727 19'41.217 |
0.208 | 158.6 | 5 | ||||
| 6 | F. Morbidelli Team VR46 |
21 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
+6.349 19'43.839 |
2.622 | 158.3 | 4 | ||||
| 7 |  F. Quartararo Yamaha Factory Racing |
20 |  |
Yamaha | 13 |
+7.102 19'44.592 |
0.753 | 158.2 | 3 | ||||
| 8 |  B. Binder Red Bull KTM Factory Racing |
33 |  |
KTM | 13 |
+7.352 19'44.842 |
0.250 | 158.1 | 2 | ||||
| 9 |  A. Ogura Trackhouse Racing Team |
79 | |
Aprilia | 13 |
+7.685 19'45.175 |
0.333 | 158.1 | 1 | ||||
| 10 | J. Zarco Team LCR |
5 |  |
Honda | 13 |
+9.346 19'46.836 |
1.661 | 157.9 | |||||
| 11 | F. Aldeguer Gresini Racing |
54 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
+10.067 19'47.557 |
0.721 | 157.8 | |||||
| 12 |  J. Miller Pramac Racing |
43 |  |
Yamaha | 13 |
+11.148 19'48.638 |
1.081 | 157.6 | |||||
| 13 | E. Bastianini Tech 3 |
23 |  |
KTM | 13 |
+11.911 19'49.401 |
0.763 | 157.5 | |||||
| 14 | F. Bagnaia Ducati Team |
63 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
+11.957 19'49.447 |
0.046 | 157.5 | |||||
| 15 | A. Rins Yamaha Factory Racing |
42 |  |
Yamaha | 13 |
+14.264 19'51.754 |
2.307 | 157.2 | |||||
| 16 | N. Bulega Ducati Team |
11 |  |
Ducati | 13 |
+14.951 19'52.441 |
0.687 | 157.1 | |||||
| 17 |  M. Oliveira Pramac Racing |
88 |  |
Yamaha | 13 |
+15.597 19'53.087 |
0.646 | 157.1 | |||||
| 18 | M. Viñales Tech 3 |
12 |  |
KTM | 13 |
+16.699 19'54.189 |
1.102 | 156.9 | |||||
| 19 | A. Espargaro Honda HRC Test Team |
41 | Honda | 13 |
+16.885 19'54.375 |
0.186 | 156.9 | ||||||
| 20 | A. Fernandez Yamaha Factory Racing |
7 |  |
Yamaha | 13 |
+18.846 19'56.336 |
1.961 | 156.6 | |||||
| 21 |  S. Chantra Team LCR |
35 |  |
Honda | 13 |
+23.028 20'00.518 |
4.182 | 156.1 | |||||
| 22 | J. Martin Aprilia Racing Team |
1 |  |
Aprilia | 13 |
+23.655 20'01.145 |
0.627 | 156.0 | |||||
| dnf | L. Marini Honda HRC |
10 |  |
Honda | 1 |
+12 Laps 1'38.301 |
12 Laps | 146.6 | Accident | ||||
| dnf | J. Mir Honda HRC |
36 |  |
Honda | 1 |
+12 Laps 1'38.403 |
0.102 | 146.5 | Accident | ||||
| View full results | |||||||||||||
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