The long and winding road of the 2025 MotoGP season finally came to an end at Valencia last weekend. In a ‘dead rubber’ on a track not known for its exciting racing, hopes weren’t particularly high.
But the finale did actually produce its fair share of talking points, happy stories and cringe moments – as well as plenty of overtaking on Sunday. And if you were paying attention to the testing concessions standings, there was even a tense, do-or-die points pursuit on offer in the last race of the season.
Honda has officially picked itself up off the floor
Gone are the days when both Japanese manufacturers were allowed unlimited testing due to their weak performance. Now there is only one of them left in Group D, because Honda has left Yamaha in its dust.
The illustrious marque’s progress in 2025 has been an excellent advert for the concessions system. Moving up to Group C is the ultimate validation of the work it has done this season, which really started to bear juicy fruit with Joan Mir’s recent podium finishes in Japan and Malaysia.
It was a tight thing to get the points it needed to step up, mind you. Just nine were required across the Valencia weekend, albeit with only the leading Honda finisher eligible to score. Struggling for pace was no reason to panic, but things really did begin to look sketchy when Honda got nothing in the sprint – partly due to Mir punting out factory team-mate Luca Marini.
Mir earned a grand prix long lap penalty for his role in that incident, as did LCR’s Johann Zarco for punting out Francesco Bagnaia on lap one of the Sunday race. Thus it boiled down to Marini having to deliver a seventh place – a spot he coolly took from Jack Miller with just six laps remaining.
Moving up to Group C will see Honda join KTM and Aprilia in that category. The latter manufacturer has shown that you can definitely win races there – and maybe even produce the best bike. That’s despite your race riders not being allowed to join private tests.
Mir referred to escaping Group D as “a symbolic thing” rewarding Honda’s technical efforts, but he and Marini are also both delighted that they will have a little more time off next season.
The sporting gods have a mean sense of humour
Last time MotoGP came to Valencia, two years ago, life was very different for Francesco Bagnaia and Jorge Martin. They were on top of the world and battling for the championship at the 2023 finale. Martin won the sprint race. Bagnaia won the grand prix and the title. All told, MotoGP was pretty good for both of them.
Even at last year’s ‘Valencia’ round, which was switched to Barcelona at the last minute because of flooding, Bagnaia and Martin were living much happier realities. This time it was Martin who took the championship, while Bagnaia enjoyed the consolation of sweeping the weekend’s races.
The 2025 finale provided a bitter illustration of how the mighty had fallen – and how fast. You couldn’t have scripted it better as they lined up alongside each other on the grid… in 16th and 17th places. Neither scored points in the sprint; neither finished the grand prix. And needless to say, world championships had long since become mere sweet memories for both.
The Bagnaia showing last weekend was sadly nothing out of the ordinary in 2025 terms. Martin was simply pleased to be there at all. For different reasons – performance and injury respectively – it has been a horror season for MotoGP’s two most recent champions before Marc Marquez. And they really had their noses rubbed in it at the scene of past glories.
Maybe the Yamaha V4 isn’t so bad after all
Fabio Quartararo had already spilt the beans on Yamaha’s plans to put its eggs in the V4 basket next season, but the Iwata manufacturer confirmed this officially in Valencia on Sunday. Is that a sign of confidence in the machine or simply a willingness to continue learning in public in order to be V4 old hands come 2027?
Listening to test rider Augusto Fernandez speak as the bike made its final 2025 wildcard appearance, you could make a case for the former. Fernandez changed his tune substantially since the development prototype’s previous race outing in Malaysia, and sounded really optimistic by the end of the Valencia weekend.
Yamaha clearly cracked on with things after Sepang. Fernandez had a revised chassis for the Valencia weekend, which began on an encouraging note when he popped it into the top 10 in FP1 on Friday morning. While it was still a tail-end fixture come the competitive stuff, the gap to pole position was only just over a second. And the plan is for four of these bikes to be ready for the race riders in tomorrow’s big test at the same track.
Fernandez reminded us on Sunday evening that the ‘real V4’ will only be seen in the 2026 pre-season test – and that Yamaha now knows exactly where it needs to improve. He also confirmed that the engine will still be in ‘safe mode’ at the Valencia test. In a way, the latter point is a public admission of sandbagging – or is that putting too optimistic a spin on things?
Whatever the case, one thing is for sure: if the ever-Eeyorish Quartararo raves about the V4 on Tuesday, then it is surely a potential world-beater.
Franco Morbidelli could be on borrowed time
If there had been an award for the most brainless moment of the year at the end-of-season ceremony, Franco Morbidelli would have taken every vote for his effort a few hours earlier.
Heading to his spot on the grid, the Roman’s thoughts were evidently elsewhere as he sideswiped the Honda of Aleix Espargaro, who had just pulled into his slot. With nobody seriously hurt, it’s OK for us to laugh harder than we have since the same Espargaro stopped racing a lap too early at Barcelona in 2022. But Morbidelli’s VR46 team certainly weren’t amused.
That’s because the hapless rider managed to fracture his hand in this most needless of incidents. He will miss this week’s important test as a result, which will put him on the back foot for 2026 before it has even begun. Engineers don’t chuckle over that sort of thing.
One level up from the garage floor, the point where some important people with Ducati connections are thinking ‘enough is enough’ may already have arrived. Yes, bonds are strong where team boss Rossi’s riders are concerned, and Morbidelli is one of his VR46 Academy graduates. But ‘Frankie’ has been alarming at times this year – and not dramatically fast, either.
This incident puts the cherry on top of a messy couple of seasons in which Simon Crafar has had to keep a seat marked ‘Franco’ reserved in the stewards’ office. A MotoGP winner he may be, but those three triumphs were back in 2020. On current form, it’s hard to see Morbidelli getting a contract for 2027.
There’s another pair of Spanish brothers waiting in line
You could be forgiven for thinking there is only one pair of brothers racing at the top level of grand prix motorcycle sport. And that’s fair enough in view of the Marquez boys having taken first and second in the MotoGP championship this year. But brace yourself for more fraternal celebrations from a different Spanish family.
It would be unfair to compare Raul Fernandez to Marc Marquez, of course, but in Valencia the elder of the Fernandez boys underlined that he has gone to the next level on the Trackhouse Aprilia. Having won the Australian Grand Prix last month, he showed that was no fluke by pushing Marco Bezzecchi’s factory Aprilia all the way to the flag.
It would also be unfair to draw a parallel with Marc’s long history of major injuries, but it is worth noting that Raul was not entirely fit for Sunday’s race. Seven days earlier, in fact, he had sat out the Portuguese Grand Prix after a big practice crash at Portimao.
Raul’s GP charge came shortly after the younger Fernandez, Adrian, had scored his breakthrough Moto3 victory earlier in the day. Sure, it has taken him a while – he has been around the category on a mostly full-time basis since 2021. But Alex Marquez also took his time ripening into the rider we saw in 2025, did he not? And Adrian Fernandez is still only 21.
It may be a big ask for the Fernandez boys from Madrid to emulate that famous duo from Cervera – but they are on course to outdo the Binders at the very least!
MotoGP’s awards ceremony needs a serious rethink
If you’re going to glam up your hosts and expect people to wear tuxedos, then make sure your event is ‘suitably’ classy and give it the time it deserves. Also, maybe don’t stage it in a temporary marquee next to a still-steaming racetrack.
The end-of-season prizegiving could so easily be a unique chance to breathe and take stock at the end of a whirlwind season. In the past, with the event taking place in downtown Valencia late Sunday evening, that has been achieved to some degree. This year, it went ahead at the circuit, less than four hours after Jorge Lorenzo waved the chequered flag to end the finale – and it felt like Dorna was paying for its tent by the minute.
With fans gathered around, booing at video images featuring Valentino Rossi, filming away with their mobiles and generally doing what fans do, the event came across as an awkward, incongruous mix. If there’s not going to be the VIP dinner typical for black-tie awards ceremonies, and you want hollering crowds, fine. But then scrap the evening dress and embrace the casual vibe properly.
It wouldn’t matter much if the event weren’t widely televised, but now Liberty Media will have to unpick the impact of this experiment on MotoGP’s image. It might do well to consider the Tuesday test’s role in the whole business. Nobody thinks partying the night before the test is a good idea, so the gala gets squeezed in on Sunday night. But what if there were no test? Fewer races and a sensible off-season would offer many an opportunity to do things differently…
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