2025 Japanese MotoGP: Marc Marquez wins the 2025 world championship at Motegi

Marc Marquez has become the 2025 MotoGP world champion after finishing second at the Japanese Grand Prix, as Ducati team-mate Pecco Bagnaia won the race.

The 32-year-old last won the title in 2019, after which he suffered a serious right arm injury at the start of the 2020 season.

This ushered in years of misery for Marc Marquez, who had to go through four major operations between 2020 and 2022, as well as two bouts of diplopia.

At the same time, Honda’s machinery proved uncompetitive, with Marquez electing to end his long association with the brand in 2023 to take up a ride at the satellite Gresini Ducati squad for 2024.

Rebuilding his career to becoming a race winner again, Marquez earned a factory Ducati promotion for 2025 and has been utterly dominant this season.

Winning 11 grands prix and 14 sprints across 17 rounds, Marquez has wrapped up the 2025 crown with a gap of 201 points.

He did so on Sunday at the Japanese Grand Prix with a ride to second, as team-mate Pecco Bagnaia brushed off apparent technical issues to score his second win of the campaign.

Marc Marquez is now a seven-time MotoGP world champion, drawing him level with Valentino Rossi and putting him on away from the all-time record of eight set by Giacomo Agostini.

He is also the first rider to win a premier class world title six years after his previous.

Marquez is now Ducati’s fourth world champion in MotoGP, after Casey Stoner, Bagnaia and Jorge Martin.

Starting from third in Sunday’s Japanese Grand Prix, Marquez had to sit behind KTM’s Pedro Acosta for the first 10 laps before getting the move for second done on the 11th tour.

But by now, the victory was well out of his reach as team-mate Bagnaia - starting from pole - was over three seconds clear.

There was a scare for Bagnaia late on, however, as smoke began to come out of the rear of his Ducati.

While the gap between himself and Marquez dropped over the final laps, his machine held out to the chequered flag for his second grand prix victory of the season.

A cautious final lap saw Marquez finish 4.196s behind in second to win the title, while Joan Mir completed the podium for the first time as a Honda rider.

Marco Bezzecchi came through from eighth to finish fourth on the factory Aprilia, with VR46’s Franco Morbidelli fifth.

Alex Marquez could do nothing to delay his older brother’s coronation in sixth on the Gresini Ducati, while Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse), Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha), Johann Zarco (LCR) and Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini) completed the top 10.

The final points went to KTM duo Enea Bastianini and Brad Binder, VR46’s Fabio Di Giannantonio, Pramac’s Miguel Oliveira and LCR’s Somkiat Chantra.

Jack Miller was a late retirement due to a broken chain on his Pramac Yamaha, while Luca Marini dropped out early with an issue on his Honda.

Acosta faded to 17th after running off track at Turn 1 on lap 19 of 24.

Full 2025 MotoGGP Japanese Grand Prix race results