“Little Brother.”
And as per, welcome back for Part 2 of my Dre’s Race Review double header, as MotoGP headed back to Spain for Round 15 of their 2025 season, the Grand Prix of Catalonia. And while it was a genuine story of two races for its ultimate winner, there was no denying Alex Marquez his glory and his second GP win of the season, finally ending Marc Marquez’s 105 day winning streak. Let’s get into it.
The Alex Marquez Experience
I wrote back in Jerez what this journey to the top meant for Alex Marquez, the little brother who had to deal in the shadows of being great in his own right, but only the second best within his own family. It’s funny in a sense, because it was that experience growing up that set the table for the Catalan weekend ended up being for Alex.
On Friday, the battle lines were clearly drawn. Alex was back to 100% of his powers after a horrible Spring. Barcelona has a track that Alex could exploit. It’s a clockwise circuit where all the important corners to attack are long, right handers. When growing up training together, Marc was superhuman on lefts from his dirt racing anti-clockwise heritage, and merely mortal on rights. Alex grow up attacking Marc’s weakness and he could use that in combination with arguably the best bike in the field – The GP24, to build a winning foundation. And it showed.
An astonishing Q2 lap, arguably the best of the year to take pole position by a good three tenths of a second on Fabio Quartararo, with Marc fourth tenths back and lucky to even be on the front row given a rejuvenated KTM and Pedro Acosta breaching track limits, and a tow from his younger brother.
Alex held the holeshot in the Sprint Race and took early control. Marc eventually got to second after a fight with Acosta and Quartararo, but could never get within four tenths of Alex, eventually throwing in the towel and taking second… only for Alex Marquez to tuck the front at Turn 10 and crash with just three laps left.
Marc gets a gift. To borrow a line from the narrator of one of my favourite games, Darkest Dungeon – “Overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.” Alex eased off thinking he had it in hand, but modern day MotoGP bikes don’t like that. These days, if you back off and don’t load the front tyre on a bike as much, the rear now has so much grip with this ultra-sticky Michelin tire, the “chatter” they generate unsettles the front of the bike more, pushing it around and eventually, it folds. That’s why Alex hit the deck when he wasn’t at 100%. It’s why Marc crashed when he lost concentration in Austin. Managing a gap has never been so difficult in this sport.
It was a body blow for Alex, who badly needed a win to reestablish himself after a horrible couple of months. Don’t forget the Assen crash that broke a metacarpal, the double DNF in Brno, and then the poor weekend it setup in Austria where he got stuck and then poor adaptation in Balaton. All while Marc built up a then, 14-race winning streak. A manageable 40-point Championship deficit ballooned up to 187 and a genuine chance of a Misano title win for Marc, 6 rounds early.
Luckily for Alex, he came back strong in the GP. Marc did his usual strategy and tried to attack early, getting to the front, but Alex got back ahead with relative ease and then Marc had to go all-out with a super high-pressure front tire to follow. Marc tried, but as said, it’s the right handers where you win and lose lap time, and when you lose a tenth and a half on the final two downhill corners, you’re in trouble as it takes away one of your biggest passing opportunities. Marc tried, but openly admitted after the fact that he was at the limit at the end of the race. So he eased off, with Alex taking his second GP win of 2025.
And the scenes? Man. I was genuinely emotional watching them. Jerez was obviously special for Alex to finally take his first Premier Class victory. But in the man’s own words, it was even more special he got to celebrate this one with his brother, something he couldn’t do when Marc crashed early on. A trip to the Marquez grandstand at the back of the track, rolling around on the tire wall and airfence, dancing and hugging. And of course, the post-race celebrations in the garages with Gresini, a team they now share a common bond with. Even I welled up watching.
Think about what these two have gone through. We all know Marc’s story, losing four years of his prime with the freakish arm break injury and his rampant addiction to get back to winning ways and the sacrifices he made to get there. And then Alex with living in Marc’s shadow, the path for validation and proving he could stand up on his own two feet in the toughest Motorsport climate in the world. They now celebrate together as one and two in the race, in the year’s Championship, and right now, as the two best riders in the world. As someone who loves his brother to death, and who knows him as his best friend, I can’t begin to imagine just how wonderful an experience that must be.
It’s the house that the Marquez brothers have built. We’re just living in it. Not bad for a guy who earlier this season was deemed “Too biased to fight his brother”.
The Extended Lightning Round
Ducati sealed their sixth straight Manufacturers title this weekend. In the first week of September. And of their 541 points so far this season, Marc Marquez has been their scorer for 454 of them1.
Speaking of Ducati… Oh, Pecco. He’s becoming the “Fell For It Award” winner for 2025. He thought Balaton was another breakthrough after having some more confidence in the race to actually push and take more risk. He brought that setup to Barcelona and then had his worst Friday and Saturday as a MotoGP rider, qualifying 21st and finishing 14th in the Sprint. He then reverted back to his 2024 setup with a few tweaks, and actually had a decent comeback to finish 7th. But the damage was done. Another weekend write-off, and you can feel the tension in that camp rising.
Pecco’s an incredibly professional and polite man, he’d never intentionally throw anyone under the bus, but when even Davide Tardozzi is saying: “We need him to help us to help him”, you can tell people are getting a bit fed up with all this. Especially when Diggia on the same bike got a Sprint podium in third. It’s been 15 weekends, it’s safe to say it’s not the bike, it’s a man that is struggling to adapt his riding style to a bike that is clearly still very, very fast.
Fabio Quartararo is doing heroic shit on the Yamaha. He’ll be testing Yamaha’s V4 for the first time as you read this post, but he qualified second, stayed with Marc in the Sprint to take second, and then finish fifth in the GP on arguably the worst bike in the field. He’s doing superhuman work with that bike and it won’t take much to keep him up there. Get it right Yamaha, it’s good for the sport if you do. Arguably rider of the weekend.
Great to see Enea Bastianini back up there properly too after showing signs of promise since Brno. A superb GP and a stunning pass on the soft-carrying Pedro Acosta to take Tech3’s first podium of the season in front of new team boss Guenther Steiner. It’s taken some time, but his adapting to the KTM looks like its finally paying off. I think another Italian can take some notes. Oh, and if you want more thoughts on Guenther’s KTM takeover, check out Ask Dre from last weekend.
Marco Bezzecchi’s outstanding run of form got entirely derailed by Fermin Aldeguer in the Sprint taking him out at the Turn 5 of Poor Judgement (Fermin himself was awful too), and then crashing almost out of response to Franco Morbidelli early on in the GP. Lucky the Italian got away with just a contusion in his left arm after Fermin’s bike fell on him during the first of those crashes.
Shoutout to Ai Ogura finding some form again and finishing 6th mind you. He’s needed a good weekend ever since the broken leg back in Silverstone and this was a good step in the right direction. Shame Aprilia, who are usually really strong in Barcelona, were nowhere this weekend, with Bez taken out, Fernandez tamer than usual, and Jorge Martin still learning how to qualify on the Aprilia. And also being taken out.
I love that we only had three Rookie winners in Moto2 in the last decade, only for two to come along in the last week. An outstanding dominant victory by Dani Holgado, a nice return to form for TNT’s favourite glazing device in Jake Dixon, and a brilliant performance from Dani Munoz in third, who was an injury replacement for Deniz Oncu. Performance of the weekend.
The Verdict: 6/10 (Decent) – Better on this one from MotoGP, the intensity of the Marquez brothers matchup was tense, and we had some decent scrapping behind too, a shame a lot of it wasn’t seen on the hard camera, but that’s TV direction for you. See you in Misano.
- Alex Marquez has 62 of those points, and Pecco Bagnaia’s victory in Austin makes up the other 25. ↩︎
