2025 French MotoGP: Marc Marquez dominates FP1 on updated Ducati chassis

Marc Marquez dominated the opening practice for the 2025 MotoGP French Grand Prix on his factory Ducati as he debuted a new chassis.

The eight-time world champion comes to Le Mans having lost the lead in the championship when he crashed while running in the podium places at the Spanish GP.

But he put this to the back of his mind on Friday morning at a cold Le Mans as he led the 45-minute FP1 by 0.576s on a factory Ducati fitted with an updated chassis he recently tested at Jerez.

He headed KTM’s Brad Binder, while Spanish GP winner and championship leader Alex Marquez completed the top three ahead of Pecco Bagnaia.

Marc Marquez set the pace in the early stages of FP1 with a 1m31.756s, which put him top of the order after the first 10 minutes of running.

Alex Marquez would briefly depose him with a 1m31.588s before his elder brother hit back with a 1m31.263s.

Marc Marquez would get the benchmark down to a 1m31.099s, which would go unchallenged until he bettered it in the closing stages with a 1m31.000s.

On a medium rear tyre with 20 laps on it, he cemented top spot with a final effort of 1m30.764s, doing so on an updated chassis.

In FP1, he had one of the new chassis and one of the standard ones.

KTM’s Binder, whose bike now resembled Maverick Vinales’, jumped up to second late on but did so on a fresh medium rear.

Alex Marquez didn’t fit new tyres and was third at the chequered flag on his Gresini Ducati, while Bagnaia was fourth.

Ai Ogura jumped up to fifth on his Trackhouse Aprilia with a late fresh medium tyre run, while Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo - running a new engine on his M1 - was sixth having stuck with the same tyres all session.

Franco Morbidelli was seventh despite a crash at Turn 8, while LCR Honda’s Johann Zarco, Gresini’s Fermin Aldeguer and Tech3’s Vinales rounded out the top 10.

Miguel Oliveira made his return to action with Pramac on Friday morning having been out since Argentina with injury and was 3.367s off the pace in 21st.

HRC wildcard Takaaki Nakagami was 19th.

Trackhouse Aprilia’s Raul Fernandez crashed at the start of the session, while there was a fall for Yamaha’s Alex Rins at Turn 3.