2025 Valencia MotoGP: Marco Bezzecchi snatches final pole of the season

Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi claimed the final MotoGP pole of the 2025 season with a new lap record to top qualifying at the Valencia Grand Prix.

Showing strong pace on Friday, the factory Aprilia star came into Saturday’s action as one of the favourites to challenge for the last pole of the campaign.

An early error in the 15-minute Q2 did nothing to knock him out of his stride, with Marco Bezzecchi producing a 1m28.809s at the start of his second run to take pole.

It was a tight session, in the end, with Alex Marquez just 0.026s behind in second, while Fabio Di Giannantonio was only 0.044s off pole in third.

The top five were covered by 0.096s at the chequered flag.

There was drama coming into the session for one of the pole favourites, as Friday pacesetter Pedro Acosta crashed towards the end of FP2.

But the Spaniard’s KTM crew was able to fix his damaged bike to ensure he had two RC16s to use in Q2.

Acosta set the early pace in the session with a 1m29.298s, though was soon beaten by Gresini Ducati’s Alex Marquez with a 1m28.967s.

Bezzecchi’s first run was scuppered by a big snap on the brakes into Turn 2 on his second flying lap, which sent him spearing off into the gravel.

This left him towards the outer reaches of the top 10, mounting the pressure on him for his second run.

But Bezzecchi came out swinging at the beginning of his second run in Q2 with just under five minutes to go, as he took top spot with a 1m28.809s.

This ultimately never went challenged, with Alex Marquez 0.026s adrift on his GP24 Ducati to score the most front rows of anyone this season.

Fabio Di Giannantonio rounded out the top three, a further 0.018s behind on his VR46 GP25, while Trackhouse Aprilia’s Raul Fernandez came from Q1 to qualify fourth.

Acosta’s pole charge never materialised in the closing stages, with the KTM rider forced to settle for fifth ahead of Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo.

Franco Morbidelli was seventh on the sister VR46 Ducati, with Pramac’s Jack Miller and Gresini’s Fermin Aldeguer forming the rest of row three.

Joan Mir could only manage 10th on the factory team Honda, with Johann Zarco 11th for LCR after coming through Q1. Ai Ogura was 12th for Trackhouse.

The big scalp in Q1 was Ducati’s Pecco Bagnaia, whose session was cut short by a technical issue while he held a place inside the top two.

The issue left him powerless to avoid being shuffled down to 16th on the grid behind KTM’s Brad Binder, Honda’s Aleix Espargaro and Luca Marini.

Aprilia’s Jorge Martin was impressive in Q2, with the 2024 world champion starting from 17th on his return. However, he will have a double long lap penalty to serve in the grand prix.

Yamaha wildcard Augusto Fernandez was 23rd after crashing the V4 in Q1, while Ducati stand-in Nicolo Bulega was 22nd.

Full 2025 MotoGP Valencia Grand Prix qualifying results