Mandalika curse broken: Sprint winner Marc Marquez is the new World Championship leader!

After Friday’s qualifying session, everything on Lombok pointed to an Aprilia showcase. Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse Aprilia) was fastest on Friday and secured the first pole position of his MotoGP career, with Marco Bezzecchi (Aprilia) and Fabio Di Giannantonio (VR46 Ducati) completing the front row. World Champion Marc Marquez had to start from fourth on the second row of the grid, whilst championship leader Jorge Martin started from fifth. Ahead of the 17th sprint of the season, just two championship points separated the two title rivals.

A domino effect at Turn 1 cost the sprint favourites dearly

Marquez got off to a superb start and darted through between Fernández and Bezzecchi at Turn 1. To avoid his Ducati team-mate Di Giannantonio, the Spaniard had to briefly lift off the throttle – triggering a chain reaction: Bezzecchi had to ease off the throttle, Fernández crashed into the Italian’s bike, and both Aprilia favourites were out of the race after just a few hundred metres. The beneficiary was Martin, who slipped through on the inside of the chaos and took the lead. Márquez settled into second place.

As early as lap 2, Marquez received a warning for exceeding the track limits; shortly afterwards, a mistake of his own cost him further time. Martin pulled out a lead of 1.5 seconds. “When I saw that Martin was in the lead, I pushed as hard as I could. On the third and fourth laps, I made a big mistake, and then he opened up a gap,” explained the 33-year-old.

Tyre pressure drama: Marquez takes the lead, Martin falls back

But then came the second twist: Martin suddenly lost a massive amount of pace – presumably due to front tyre pressure being too low. Marquez overtook him. Although the World Championship leader closed in on the Ducati star once more, Martin had to avoid a crash in the closing stages and dropped back to fourth place. “At the end, as always, I tried to manage the risk and the gap to Ogura,” explained Marquez. The strain of racing in extreme heat and humidity was clearly evident on his face: completely drenched in sweat, he had to sit down for a moment before the podium ceremony.

With this victory, Marquez took the lead in the World Championship for the first time this season and heads into the Grand Prix with a four-point lead over Martin. Red is also back in the lead in the Constructors’ Championship. For Marquez, it was his eighth sprint victory of 2026 and, at the same time, the end of his Mandalika curse: In four previous attempts at Mandalika, Márquez had previously scored just eleven points and had never seen the chequered flag at any Grand Prix; in 2025, a crash at the start involving Bezzecchi ended his season here.

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MotoGP World Championship

11.10.2026 - 03:35