MotoGP Valencia GP: Bezzecchi storms to pole with circuit record

Aprilia rider Marco Bezzecchi smashed the all-time circuit record at Ricardo Tormo to claim pole position for MotoGP’s 2025 season-ending Valencia Grand Prix.

Having dropped to ninth on the timesheets following an off-track excursion at Turn 2 on his first flying lap, Bezzecchi bounced back strongly on his second run to set a blistering lap time of 1m28.809s.

Although all his rivals got at least one more lap to snatch the top spot from him, the Italian held firm to end the final stretch of the campaign with back-to-back pole positions - having also topped qualifying last weekend in Portugal.

In-form Alex Marquez came closest to dethroning Bezzecchi, qualifying second on the Gresini Ducati. Marquez was the first rider to break the 1m29s barrier this weekend, climbing to the top spot of the timesheets with a 1m28.967s on his first run. While he managed to find over a tenth of a second on his final flying lap, he still fell 0.026s short of Bezzecchi’s benchmark.

Fabio di Giannantonio put together a solid performance to qualify third for VR46 Ducati, with Trackhouse rider Raul Fernandez coming from Q1 to grab fourth on the grid.

Pre-qualifying favourite Pedro Acosta was only fifth-fastest on the factory KTM, but he ended up just 0.096s off pole in an ultra-competitive session. The 20-year-old suffered a crash in the final minutes of FP2, hampering his preparations for qualifying.

Sixth place went to factory Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo, who once again shone in qualifying to secure a spot on the second row. Franco Morbidelli put his VR46 Ducati seventh on the grid, beating Pramac rider Jack Miller and Gresini’s Fermin Aldeguer.

Honda had a low-key qualifying with factory rider Joan Mir finishing only 10th and LCR’s Johann Zarco just behind him in 11th. Although Trackhouse’s Ai Ogura topped the FP2 session that preceded qualifying, he was 12th and slowest among the Q2 runners with a time that was 0.562s slower than Bezzecchi’s pole effort.

Ai Ogura, Trackhouse Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

Factory Honda rider Luca Marini missed out on Q2 by half a tenth and will line up 13th on the grid, just ahead of HRC test rider Aleix Espargaro and KTM ace Brad Binder.

Francesco Bagnaia could only qualify 16th after parking his factory Ducati at Turn 8 due to what appeared to be a technical problem. The two-time MotoGP champion had been sitting second in Q1 with three minutes left when his bike let go, but a flurry of late improvements demoted him to the sixth row of the grid.

Returning to MotoGP for the first time since his crash in the Motegi sprint race in September, 2024 title winner Jorge Martin qualified 17th on the Aprilia RS-GP.

Marc Marquez’s substitute Nicolo Bulega ended qualifying in 22nd, while Yamaha test rider Augusto Fernandez could finish no higher than 23rd on the V4-powered M1 after crashing early in Q1 and mounting on his second bike.

Q2 results:

Q2

All Stats

 

Cla	Rider	#		Bike	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Speed Trap
1	M. Bezzecchi Aprilia Racing Team	72		Aprilia	9	1'28.809		162.348
2	A. Marquez Gresini Racing	73		Ducati	9	+0.026 1'28.835	0.026	162.300
3	F. Di Giannantonio Team VR46	49		Ducati	8	+0.044 1'28.853	0.018	162.268
4	R. Fernández Trackhouse Racing Team	25		Aprilia	9	+0.058 1'28.867	0.014	162.242
5	P. Acosta Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	37		KTM	9	+0.096 1'28.905	0.038	162.173
6	F. Quartararo Yamaha Factory Racing	20		Yamaha	8	+0.169 1'28.978	0.073	162.040
7	F. Morbidelli Team VR46	21		Ducati	8	+0.257 1'29.066	0.088	161.879
8	J. Miller Pramac Racing	43		Yamaha	9	+0.335 1'29.144	0.078	161.738
9	F. Aldeguer Gresini Racing	54		Ducati	9	+0.360 1'29.169	0.025	161.692
10	J. Mir Honda HRC	36		Honda	9	+0.424 1'29.233	0.064	161.576
11	J. Zarco Team LCR	5		Honda	9	+0.542 1'29.351	0.118	161.363
12	A. Ogura Trackhouse Racing Team	79		Aprilia	9	+0.562 1'29.371	0.020	161.327
View full results

Q1 results:

Q1

All Stats

 

Cla	Rider	#		Bike	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Speed Trap
1	R. Fernández Trackhouse Racing Team	25		Aprilia	9	1'29.036		161.934	330
2	J. Zarco Team LCR	5		Honda	8	+0.424 1'29.460	0.424	161.167	338
3	L. Marini Honda HRC	10		Honda	8	+0.484 1'29.520	0.060	161.058	335
4	A. Espargaro Honda HRC Test Team	41		Honda	8	+0.490 1'29.526	0.006	161.048	330
5	B. Binder Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	33		KTM	8	+0.525 1'29.561	0.035	160.985	340
6	F. Bagnaia Ducati Team	63		Ducati	6	+0.548 1'29.584	0.023	160.943	333
7	J. Martin Aprilia Racing Team	1		Aprilia	8	+0.594 1'29.630	0.046	160.861	328
8	M. Oliveira Pramac Racing	88		Yamaha	8	+0.621 1'29.657	0.027	160.812	332
9	A. Rins Yamaha Factory Racing	42		Yamaha	8	+0.871 1'29.907	0.250	160.365	335
10	E. Bastianini Tech 3	23		KTM	8	+0.912 1'29.948	0.041	160.292	332
11	M. Viñales Tech 3	12		KTM	7	+0.951 1'29.987	0.039	160.223	333
12	N. Bulega Ducati Team	11		Ducati	9	+1.009 1'30.045	0.058	160.119	335
13	A. Fernandez Yamaha Factory Racing	7		Yamaha	7	+1.074 1'30.110	0.065	160.004	327
14	S. Chantra Team LCR	35		Honda	9	+1.221 1'30.257	0.147	159.743	337
View full results