2026 Sepang MotoGP test: Alex Marquez leads final day as Marc Marquez crashes
Alex Marquez led the final day of the first 2026 pre-season MotoGP test
Gresini Ducati MotoGP rider Alex Marquez led the final day of the Sepang test, as Yamaha returned to action after missing Wednesday’s running with technical issues.
Completing his first test on factory Ducati machinery, Alex Marquez led the way on the final day at Sepang at the end of the first hour.
Setting a 1m56.402s, that time would go unchallenged through to the chequered flag, with the Gresini rider focusing on race running later in the day.
He headed Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi, who moved to within 0.124s of Marquez with a late charge to 1m56.526s.
VR46 Ducati’s Fabio Di Giannantonio completed the top three on the second of the satellite GP26s.
Reigning world champion Marc Marquez was fourth overall at the end of the final day, though did suffer a small crash at Turn 1 early in the session.
He remounted to carry on with evaluating aero packages on his GP26, as well as completing a promising sprint simulation.
Ducati’s factory riders appear to be split between the 2024-spec and 2025-spec front aero package, as the 2026 version didn’t make an appearance.
Pecco Bagnaia completed the top five on the sister factory team Ducati, while Franco Morbidelli was sixth on the VR46-run GP25.
Raul Fernandez ended the day seventh on the leading Trackhouse Aprilia, ahead of KTM’s Pedro Acosta, Honda’s Joan Mir and Tech3 KTM rider Enea Bastianini.
Alex Rins was the leading Yamaha in 12th, as the Japanese marque returned to the circuit on Thursday after missing day two.
The Japanese marque benched all of its riders on Wednesday due to an engine issue, with the decision made on safety grounds.
Yamaha was able to find a fix to the problem to allow running to continue on Thursday, with the V4 M1s seemingly running with reduced revs to avoid stressing the engine.
Rins completed a sprint simulation later in the day, with Pramac counterparts Jack Miller and Toprak Razgatlioglu 17th and 18th on the timesheets.
Fabio Quartararo did not ride on Thursday, after breaking a finger in a crash on Tuesday.
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