The signs that suggest Marc Marquez holds critical Aragon MotoGP advantage

Because of his physical condition, more emphasis than ever is being placed on Marc Marquez’s ability to perform at anticlockwise circuits. In 2026 alone, he’s already won at two of them, in Hungary and Germany. For his career to date, he’s got a 61% hit rate for wins on anticlockwise circuits.

In the past, they just suited his riding style. Since his right arm injury in 2020, and the more recent issues he’s had with his shoulder since last October, they’ve allowed him to take the strain off the weaker side of his body and ride more freely.

Following the British Grand Prix, Marquez was captured by Ducati’s cameras saying he had “no control” over his right arm during the main race at Silverstone. On Thursday at Aragon, he explained that he attacked the Silverstone weekend too aggressively, too early, and came into the grand prix with no energy reserves.

And it proved costly. From starting that weekend 18 points down in the standings, he left the UK countryside 40 points down on a Jorge Martin that looks to have hit his stride again on the factory Aprilia.

Aragon, then, is a chance to reduce that deficit again ahead of a pretty tricky run of races in the coming weeks. The Austrian Grand Prix will see a return of Michelin’s stiffer tyre casing, which suited Aprilia in the early races of the year and worked against Ducati. Misano is a pretty fast right-handed track, while Motegi is the hardest on braking and also runs clockwise.

In a particularly insightful hour of television during MotoGP’s world feed broadcast of Practice at the Aragon Grand Prix, Cal Crutchlow likened Marquez’s 2026 season to an “endurance race”, where he will have to grab the big points when the opportunity presents itself and limit the damage elsewhere.

Championships aren’t won through just one good race result. So, must-win would be over-egging Marquez’s Aragon round evaluation. However, it presents a golden opportunity in a title battle he is going to have to win in such a different way to what he is used to.

Since joining Ducati with Gresini in 2024, Marquez hadn’t actually been topped in a session at Aragon that he took part in (he sat out warm-up in 2024). That trend continued into FP1, where he led the way. But he was toppled in Practice.

Despite besting his own lap record from last year, it wasn’t enough to keep him fastest of all, as Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi snatched top spot away from him, while Alex Marquez shuffled him down to third. But a 0.038s gap to Bezzecchi isn’t much to worry about at this stage.

Marquez accused of ‘hiding’ on Friday at Aragon

Marquez, typically, named a few riders he was wary of. But the rest were pretty sure that Marquez was still the favourite. Bezzecchi remarked: “It's true that Marc was, for sure, hiding a little bit, because he didn't even do the second time attack, and I'm sure tomorrow he will be the man to beat. But, at the moment, it's okay for me.

If we look purely at the pace average from the hour-long Practice session on Friday afternoon, Marquez’s stint stands out. While he didn’t do any significantly long running, testing both the medium and the soft, he made a comparable run of four representative laps on a new medium to Bezzecchi.

Marquez’s pace worked out at 1m46.835s, while Bezzecchi was at 1m47.047s.

If we dig a bit deeper into Friday’s running, there are more signs to suggest that Marquez holds a critical advantage going into Saturday. For starters, after posting the 1m45.493s that put him underneath his own lap record and briefly top of the pile at the end of Practice, he didn’t fit a fresh soft rear for his final lap.

That final lap, on a five-lap-old soft rear that had already done a qualifying simulation, he produced a 1m45.965s. That would have kept him sixth on the timesheets if that was his best effort.

After 16 laps on the same medium tyre in FP1, Marquez managed a 1m48.179s. Bezzecchi did produce a 1m47.753s on a 15-lap-old tyre, but he’d spent much of that session in the 1m48s before he got to it.

Marquez said he was in “attack mode” on Friday, damning his suggestions from Thursday that he had to manage his energy in a better way across a weekend to avoid a repeat of Silverstone. Aragon allows him to do that. But even like this, it’s clear that there is still something in reserve that the reigning champion is yet to unleash.

“Still some small points,” he asked if he had anything to improve. “The base of the bike is good, I’m feeling well, and we are changing small things. We need to try tomorrow morning a small thing, [to see] if I can be a bit faster. But the fact that I’m very consistent means that I feel comfortable with the bike.”

Aragon has typically favoured Ducati in recent years, with Alex Marquez and Fabio Di Giannantonio up there on the timesheets. On the best partial times, all sectors were topped by Alex Marquez, save for the third split, which saw Marc Marquez fastest.

Race pace-wise, however, they have some work to do to get on terms with Marc Marquez and even Bezzecchi on the Aprilia.

Aprilia beats lap record on “one of our worst tracks”, but work to do

The 2026 MotoGP season has shaped up into something of a grind for the brands. While the Ducati and the Aprilia remain the best bikes, there has been a great deal of back and forth depending on the circuit.

At Assen, Aprilia was a step clear. That pendulum then swung back in Ducati’s favour at the Sachsenring. Silverstone was far kinder to Aprilia than it was Ducati. And, at this stage, it looks like Aragon is delivering the expected boost to Ducati.

Jorge Martin, the championship leader, said Aragon is “one of our worst tracks”, referring to Aprilia. He said that on Friday afternoon, after his team-mate Bezzecchi had beaten the lap record to lead the day outright.

Typically, in Aprilia’s harder days, Aragon generally offered a boost for the Italian manufacturer. Given the strengths of the RS-GP now, the track should suit it much more, levelling out some of Ducati’s advantage. Of course, the biggest advantage Ducati has that Aprilia will have a hard time against at the Spanish venue is Marc Marquez.

Bezzecchi looks like the Aprilia rider most likely to stage this fight. Trackhouse’s Raul Fernandez is a step behind him on pace, based on his soft tyre running in Practice, while Martin’s championship lead is in some risk at this stage.

Speaking about his day, Bezzecchi said he was “feeling good with the bike”, though “I’m still making a couple of mistakes”. What’s most likely to hinder his challenge is the knee injury he’s been carrying since the summer break.

At Aragon, that will become more taxing as the weekend goes on, because he’ll be putting a lot of pressure through that left knee. However, he did note that he does “feel better compared to Silverstone”.

Martin’s struggles centre on the front of the bike, as has been the case several times this season. That is somewhat understandable, given he hasn’t ridden at Aragon since his Pramac Ducati days in 2024, when the asphalt had just been relaid and was very slippery for that weekend.

He said he’s battling a considerable drop in grip on the front tyre after just a few laps, and isn’t able to brake and turn like he wants.

Martin has a 31-point lead in the standings to work with, but that’s at risk of being eaten into by Bezzecchi and Marquez if he can’t make a set-up breakthrough on Saturday for qualifying.