“Marco Bezzecchi, why didn’t he pass me?”
Hey readers, welcome back to another edition of Dre’s Race Review, and another double header weekend – This time, we’re going bikes first, and it’s one of the blue-ribbon events of the MotoGP calendar – The Centennial anniversary of the Assen TT, with the area celebrating 100 years of racing. And with it, Marc Marquez making history of his own with Premier Class win #68. Let’s talk about it.
Battle Of Resilience
Marquez didn’t take the easy road on this one, trust me. On Friday, he suffered two very quick crashes – downshifting too quickly at the 100+ mph Ramshoek, and then again in timed practice at Ruskenhoek, scraping his nuts along the ground, hence why he needed help getting back to his feet. He’s 32 and he’s already making sure kids aren’t an option. He was bruised, and took a 27G shot to the elbow, and a stitch to the chin, but he was still quick enough to easily make Q2, and qualify fourth.
He got the start of the Gods in the Sprint race, immediately going to second. It only took a lap for Marquez to slingshot off the final chicane and pass polesitter Fabio Quartararo to take control, with brother Alex following him through. What we got next was a very intriguing battle for the lead – and chum if you’ve been the sort of person who genuinely believes Alex Marquez isn’t racing his brother hard.
Marc had a weakness all weekend, he was slow, maybe 1-2 tenths slower compared to some, at Turns 11 and 12, the transition into Sector 4. But because Turn 11 isn’t really a braking zone, and Turn 12 is pure acceleration, if you defend the racing line it’s virtually impossible to pass. So Alex would have been forced into an incredibly risky maneuver (Remember that, it becomes important later), to try and take the lead, and a risk almost certainly not worth taking. Marc weathered the storm to win his ninth Sprint race of the year, and keeping the 100% record of Marquez brothers 1-2’s over half distance.
It was a similar story in the Grand Prix, but the aggressor was different. More on that shortly, but Alex Marquez wasn’t having as easy a time, shoved back to fifth place on the road, and duelling with Pedro Acosta, who was having his best Grand Prix of 2025 so far. Acosta and Marquez came out of Strubben side-by-side, but Acosta was inching ahead. They rub shoulders, and down Alex went, breaking a metacarpal in his left hand in the process.
It wasn’t irresponsible, or egregious from either party. It was an elbow rub with the front tyre bouncing, unsettling the bike, and causing the crash. Alex left Assen in a sling and is likely being operated on in Madrid tonight. Alex out. Brother, winning. The title deficit, now 68 points. Barring a miracle, that might be a title defining crash.
The aggressor that laid down a huge effort to try and beat Marquez, was Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi, with the help of some new aero parts from Noale. It was one of the best MotoGP performances the Italian’s had since getting to the top flight. He passed Alex Marquez, Fabio Quartararo, and Pecco Bagnaia to get to the front of the queue, and then hounded Marquez like a dog chasing a hare for the better part of 20 laps. Only on the final two laps, when Marc dropped 100% of his pace, did he finally break away from Bez, but he had to work for it, especially given he was still in pain from those injuries. Like with Alex, in Sector three, Bez was visibly quicker and closing in on Marc, but his punch on corner exit from Ducati’s obscene rear grip and being able to defend his vulnerabilities was what got Marc over the line here. With the only real question mark on Marc’s ridiculous 2025 season being his temperament and concentration, he got his head down and clutched up.
With it, he takes his sixth win of the season, his third in a row for the first time since 2019, and his 68th victory in the Premier Class, tying him with the great Giacomo Agostini for second on the all-time wins list. Only Valentino Rossi’s 89 remains and with the way Marc’s riding the GP25 right now, he’s going to take a big chunk of that deficit out by years end.
That Shitpost
There was aftermath to last week’s post-Mugello fallout, with Marc Marquez angrily defending his brother’s racecraft after accusations he was intentionally racing his brother differently. Marc openly admitted he’d read the social media posts and his team had informed him of them too, and laid out an impassioned defence:
“I want to say to people that they need to respect all the riders,” said Marc. “Yesterday in the media sessions [people started suggesting] ‘your brother didn’t attack you like other riders’. And my mechanics told me that people were starting to talk about things on social media too.
“And today? Why didn’t Marco attack me? [Because] on this track, which is super narrow, you cannot attack the rider in front. So, yesterday, I defended against Alex in the best way possible and today I defended against Marco in the best way possible. One more time: respect the MotoGP riders. All of them defend their colours and defend their teams. The whole grid wants to win. But the problem is that only one is able to win.”
Now I don’t mind tearing the bandaid off on this one – I got blocked by my former colleague Simon Patterson on Twitter for being on the other side of the fence in regards to these accusations. I own it, it was a sly dig and I didn’t think the tweet would get the traction it ultimately got. I’ll give the big man this – It takes a pair of steel ones to ask the question. It’s what journalists should do. Did it need to be asked? That’s up to you to debate. The two follow-up questions I have are this:
- Why did we not give Alex or Marc Marquez the good faith argument in the first place and assume they race each other in a hard but fair fashion?
- Why has Alex Marquez taken more criticism for having by a MILE the best year of his career, when Pecco Bagnaia is on the same bike as Marc, and is now 127 points behind after 10 race weekends?
Generally, I think the sport has largely been more sympathetic then critical of Pecco. I would make the argument that the Italian is far more accountable for the air being taken out of this title fight, than the customer Ducati title contender that no-one predicted would run his brother this closely after nearly 50% of the season. And no matter how you slice it, implying a a rider is intentionally softballing his brother and doesn’t want to win the World Championship is incredibly disrespectful. These guys are risking their lives indirectly for our entertainment, and sacrifice so much to be able to do so. To suggest otherwise is a spit in the face to that rider, their team, and to us as an audience.
And you know that.
The Lightning Round
The Jorge Martin civil war continued this weekend at Assen, with Martin’s agent Albert Valera in attendance and telling Autosport that Martin’s free to sign with whoever he chooses for the 2026 season, and that Honda was an option. A continuation of Martin’s statement a month ago where he clearly outlined that he had a release clause to activate at the end of 2025 if he wasn’t in the Top 3 of the standings. Aprilia responded by essentially saying: “No comment”, but CEO Massimo Rivera made it clear that they still want to keep him:
“For us, the rider is under contract with us. There are only two options: Either we find an agreement and need to sit down and speak seriously, or go to the court. We’re ready to do both. Our priority is to keep the rider.”
And if you’re Jorge Martin, I’m genuinely curious – How did he feel after watching Marco Bezzecchi nearly become a two-time race winner in 2025? A rookie in terms of that machine, pushing Marc Marquez to his limit? Because I ask Jorge sincerely – Why would you want a Honda over an Aprilia right now? Johann Zarco’s bottle of miracle juice has seemingly ran out after Silverstone, and they’re back to fringe points scorers and slipping back to fourth in the Constructors battle. Aprilia are now back in second place and have matched Honda’s peaks, just without the major shenanigans.
This contract holdout and jettison from Martin is looking more stubborn and foolish by the week, and the World Champion is quickly losing a lot of perceived leverage. When it’s getting to the point where even Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta has to chime in and say: “We won’t register you in the Championship until this is resolved”, people are starting to lose their patience. But both sides are refusing to back down. Where does this go, and what does this mean for Honda, who are actively waiting on his availability?
Stay tuned, Liberty Media’s confirmed purchase of Dorna Sports will be talked about on next week’s Ask Dre.
You know shit is horrible at LCR Honda when the factory is considering breaking up the lucrative Idemitsu partnership with LCR purely because Somkiat Chantra has been so poor, they wanna cut bait with him after just one season. I genuinely feel bad for the man, but it’s a rare case of a MotoGP rider who’s genuinely out of his depth at this level.
Have to say as well, an absolutely disgraceful bit of officiating in the Moto3 race today. Luca Lunetta gets run over at the final chicane on the penultimate lap in a hellacious three bike crash between him, Taiyo Furasato and David Almansa. It’s shown on the hard camera as it happens. Lunetta had to be stretched off for what later turned out to be a broken leg. But it took Race Control an entire full lap to Red Flag the race, to the point where the entire field was entering and was even beyond the incident before as it dropped. It was awful, it was needlessly dangerous and it shows a disregard for the safety of the athletes involved. Moto3 has ridden its luck with these delayed non-calls and pack racing for far too long. We need more power in these bikes and to break up these pack races. It’s moved from entertaining to flat out dangerous, and Luca Lunetta was very, very lucky it was only a broken leg. Best wishes to the young Italian.
Michelin scrapping their 2026 front tyre is a hammerblow for entertainment purposes in MotoGP. Turns out not enough of the field pushed for it after testing to implement it and it’s now being scrapped entirely. I suspect Michelin moving to World Superbikes with Pirelli moving the other way may have had something to do with it too – why spend all that money if you’re out of the sport in 18 months anyway? A real shame all round, the sport needs everything it can get in terms of entertainment value and it shouldn’t be pissing opportunities up the wall.
Congratulations to Diogo Moreira, Moto2’s first ever Brazilian winner, beating Aron Canet in a race long dogfight to do it. With Brazil hitting the MotoGP calendar in 2026, there’ll be a push for a MotoGP team to sign him. Just a shame it makes me think back to those passport jokes on TNT Sports when Manu Gonzalez is being held back because he’s Spanish, god forbid.
The Verdict: 7/10 (Good) – A pretty enjoyable Assen TT all around. An intense leading group with Marquez squared, Acosta, Bagnaia for most of the race, and the tenseness ramped up with Bez stalking Marquez all the way home. Add in the Alex flashpoint, and you’ve got a dramatic one. See you at the… Sachsenring? Ah fuck.
