Pedro Acosta scores maiden MotoGP win, Marc Marquez fifth in Austria
Pedro Acosta is finally a MotoGP race winner
KTM’s Pedro Acosta is finally a winner in MotoGP after taking victory at the Austrian Grand Prix, as Jorge Martin extended his championship lead over Marc Marquez.
After crashing out of the lead of the sprint on Saturday, Pedro Acosta came into Sunday’s race off the back of another spill in warm-up.
But he showed no signs of making the same mistake in the 28-lap grand prix, as he beat Aprilia’s Jorge Martin to claim his first victory and end KTM’s drought dating back to 2022.
Martin was 1.017s off the lead at the chequered flag in second, having resisted late pressure from Aprilia team-mate Marco Bezzecchi.
Marc Marquez struggled to fifth on the factory Ducati, dropping 12 points behind Martin in the standings now, as he faded 7.3s off the lead in the race.
Martin converted pole to the holeshot at the start of the race ahead of Bezzecchi, while Ai Ogura on the Trackhouse Aprilia moved through on Marquez at Turn 2 for third.
Bezzecchi took the lead at the start of the second lap with a move into Turn 1, though Martin would repay the favour at the same place next time around.
Acosta has also worked his way into third by this point and passed Bezzecchi for second on the fourth tour at Turn 2.
The KTM rider set about pressuring Martin in the lead, with the pair close to contact at Turn 5 on lap eight as the Aprilia ran slightly wide.
Acosta took the lead from Martin on the exit of Turn 1 as he got a better run out of the corner.
He wouldn’t escape, however, with Martin keeping the gap between 0.6-0.8s for most of the remaining laps.
But Acosta would ultimately hold on to claim his first grand prix victory of any kind since 2023 in the Moto2 class.
Martin was just 0.192s ahead of Bezzecchi at the chequered flag, while Ogura was a further 0.930s adrift in fourth.
Reigning champion Marquez had been in fourth in the early stages after a steady start, but ran off track at Turn 1 at the start of the tenth tour.
He had to fight his way through again on Gresini’s Fermin Aldeguer and KTM’s Brad Binder to get back to fifth, where he would remain to the chequered flag.
Binder was sixth at the finish, with Pecco Bagnaia seventh on the second of the factory team Ducatis.
Aldeguer was demoted to eighth due to a late penalty for contact on the closing stages, while Fabio Di Giannantonio (VR46) and Johann Zarco (LCR) rounded out the top 10.
Enea Bastianini was 11th on the Tech3 KTM, with Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse), Takaaki Nakagami (Honda), Luca Marini (Honda) and Diogo Moreira (LCR) securing the final points.
Fabio Quartararo had been inside the top 10 during the race, but faded to 17th on the leading Yamaha.
Gresini’s Alex Marquez was the only crasher in the grand prix.
