Pecco Bagnaia claps back at theories Marc Marquez has hurt his MotoGP form

Ducati’s Pecco Bagnaia has hit back at repeated claims his MotoGP struggles are because Marc Marquez is his team-mate, pointing out that “I’m having trouble now that Marc is home”.

The double world champion has struggled all year on the factory GP25, but since the summer break has seen his form turn down even further.

Despite winning at the Japanese Grand Prix, Pecco Bagnaia has gone pointless in three of the last four rounds, with his Motegi breakthrough not able to be replicated.

Bagnaia is facing even more pressure to carry Ducati's hopes, now that reigning champion team-mate Marc Marquez has been ruled out for the rest of the year with injury.

For most of this season, the mental challenge of being team-mates with Marquez has been cited as a key reason for Bagnaia’s struggles.

Earlier this week, Bagnaia’s mentor Valentino Rossi even suggested this was the case.

But Bagnaia hit back at this on Friday at the Malaysian Grand Prix.

“I can say what I want, but people can believe it or not,” he told Sky Italy.

“I was having trouble before when he was on the track; I’m having trouble now that Marc is home.

“Honestly, the problems are different.”

Q2 miss hides better feeling for Bagnaia on Friday at Sepang

Pecco Bagnaia’s Malaysian Grand Prix weekend hasn’t gotten off to the ideal start, as he failed to secure a direct place in Q2.

However, he feels he has made a step and that his failure to get into Q2 was down to “a bit of chaos at the end of the session”.

“Today, there was a bit of chaos at the end of the session and we didn’t make it to Q2,” he explained.

“But after the last two weekends, it was still difficult to think about getting back in.

“We’ve made a small step forward; in fact, we were quite far ahead in both sessions, even though what happened then happened.

“We need to stay calm, and tomorrow will be a pretty important and difficult Q1. We definitely hope to improve.”

Stability issues plagued Bagnaia at the Australian Grand Prix last weekend, which seemed to persist on Friday at Sepang, albeit to a lesser extent.

“In the last sector, for some reason, I can’t get the throttle open, either in Turns 14 or 15,” he added.

“When I get on the gas, I can’t get any traction, but it all starts from the entrance [to the corner] because I’m struggling to get the bike to turn.

“I’m not able to take advantage of the braking on those corners.

“Generally, the movements are something we’ve been carrying around since the beginning of the year; sometimes there’s more, sometimes less.

“Unfortunately, they’ve been hindering us a lot lately. They started to get worse from the Austrian sprint, and from then on we’ve struggled a bit to identify the problem.”