In Jerez the red car won the first race of its 2026 thanks to Team Gresini: the world champion of the official team, however, says that the team is not competitive for the title, words dismantled by the rivals from Noale
It risks becoming a World Cup full of enigmas, as well as quite exciting and probably uncertain. So, ultimately, very fascinating. The great reset, “the real start of the World Championship”, as is cloyingly repeated when we talk in general about the first European grand prix of the year and Jerez in particular, said that Ducati has relaunched itself, refreshed. How else could you define a manufacturer that scores a hat-trick in the sprint race and then places two bikes on the podium on Sunday? Especially since the first three grands prix of the season had raised doubts and the long four-week wait had only made them more annoying. Well, the Spanish GP, in terms of results, you would say has, if not exactly dispelled them, certainly clarified them to a large extent. Yet, in the face of such comforting results, the most representative man of the team, the world champion Marc Márquez, says: “If we continue like this we are not a title holder. We cannot be because at the end of every weekend, on Sunday, we lose points. And when things like this happen it means that you are missing something”.
discordant words
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Yet the performance seems to have been there, regardless of what Aprilia and Marco Bezzecchi manage or fail to do. So what Marc says is out of place. It seems strange even considering all the caution needed to interpret his statements. Because, let’s be clear, Marc is the last rider and perhaps also the last person in the world who you would expect to give up, so even in the face of a temporary awareness of his own limits and those of his team, anything can be except a surrender. Indeed, perhaps it is actually an attempt to shake up the environment, to point out to a team that has been world champion and dominator for four years that glory does not live on income. Not that anyone in Borgo Panigale is under any illusion of anything of the sort, Gigi Dall’Igna and his men wouldn’t be where they are if they were inclined to wallow in satisfaction. The point is to try to understand to what extent Marc Márquez is truly sincere in his statements and not a tactician. Certainly he was the first to say that the evaluation is such for the current moment: we are not in a position at the moment, he meant to say.
pre-tactics master
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After all, we have understood from time immemorial that he is a master of pre-tactics. But it’s clear that something isn’t right. Let’s take another statement he made during the Jerez weekend: “My brother Alex is able to give three-four tenths to everyone here.” Words spoken at the start of the weekend. And then, evidently, supported by facts. Marc said exactly what we would then see. And also on Sunday, speaking about the overtaking suffered by his little brother, he said: “I didn’t fight too much because I knew well that he had more. If he hadn’t passed me in that one, he would have done so in any of the subsequent corners. My fight wasn’t with him. My level was third-fourth place.” But how? Since when is Alex so irresistible? It’s true, he also won in Jerez last year. And Marc likes Jerez more for the support and the atmosphere than for the track, but when has it ever happened that the little brother was inevitably, without question, stronger than the big brother? One could imagine a sudden improvement from little Márquez, in the wake of the great 2025 season he could also be there, and in fact Marc also underlined: “On the right corners he has always been very strong, now he does the left ones… like I do them…”. That is, like no other in the world. So maybe it’s really just a question of the circuit becoming so favorable to Alex, especially since in the previous three grands prix of the season, in Thailand, Brazil and Texas, he didn’t do much, he never went higher than sixth place.
physical condition
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Likewise, the fact that Marc declares himself and then actually proves himself to be so inferior to him is very strange. Throughout the first phase of the championship there was a lot of talk about his health conditions and the after-effects of the injury he suffered last year in Indonesia, but arriving in Andalusia, and at several points during the Jerez weekend, he said and reiterated that he was fine, that he felt 100%. So, if the bike he has is capable of winning as his brother demonstrated, why is his level “third-fourth place”? It should, a comparison with Bagnaia could help, but these days Pecco is certainly not the one you can take as a reference, his performance is too erratic. And on Sunday he also had that “inconvenience” with the front which threw everything away. There was a phrase uttered over the weekend that provided an interpretative key to the World Cup, certainly of the World Cup up to now but presumably also from here onwards. Jorge Martin pronounced it. To those who asked him if Ducati, in his opinion, had closed the gap somewhat or completely against its Aprilia, Jorge replied: “Gap? What gap? There is no gap, in fact perhaps there never was. There have been moments and situations in which the balance has been different from one time to another. But our bikes are essentially the same, this is a riders’ championship”. Great feeling to hear that. Except that usually, when this is the case, there is only one who stands out, and that is Marc Márquez. There have been championships in the past in which he was able to win the title without having the best bike, let alone what it should be and what it should do with the same bike. And instead he says: “My level is third-fourth place.” Was it just a question of Jerez? Will the tests underway at the moment on the Andalusian circuit provide pieces and solutions for a turning point? Appointment at Le Mans for the new answers.
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