Marquez brothers lead Sepang charge on Friday as injured Martin calls it a day

MotoGP 2026

Round 19 – Sepang – Friday

MotoGP Practice

Marc Marquez completed a clean sweep of Friday MotoGP proceedings at Sepang, overcoming an earlier crash to top the crucial afternoon Practice session, while injured championship rival Jorge Martin called an early end to his day following a frightening front-end slide.

Conditions remained dry despite earlier forecasts warning of possible thunderstorms, but the heat had intensified considerably. The ambient temperature was 34 degrees, the circuit had climbed to 49 degrees and humidity stood at 61 per cent.

Marco Bezzecchi came out firing, dropping in a 1m58.620s less than five minutes into the hour-long session, only for Johann Zarco to then surprise with a 1m58.033s.

Alex Marquez subsequently moved to the top with a 1m58.000s before Fabio Di Giannantonio became the first rider to break into the 1m57s, recording a 1m57.982s just under seven minutes into proceedings.

However, the attention in the Aprilia garage was focussed on Jorge Martin. The Spaniard was on a quick lap when he suffered an enormous front-end slide through Turn Twelve. The front folded while he was carrying some 55 degrees of lean angle at more than 150 km/h, but he somehow managed to ride it out and stay upright.

It was a remarkable save, particularly considering the fractured right wrist sustained only six days earlier at Phillip Island, and there was palpable relief among the Aprilia Racing personnel.

Martin immediately returned to the pits and went behind the pit wall to discuss the situation with team personnel. A few minutes later, Aprilia Racing announced that Martin would take no further part in Friday’s proceedings. The team said he might return on Saturday but wanted to rest his injured wrist overnight before deciding. The Spaniard completed only three laps in the afternoon, including a single valid flying lap of 1m59.670s on his second lap.  Martin’s third lap was the one affected by his Turn Twelve moment and subsequent return to the pits.

The bigger question was whether his damaged wrist would recover sufficiently for him to continue his championship challenge on Saturday.

With just ten points separating Martin and Marc Marquez, the stakes could hardly be higher.

Jack Miller was also finding the limits of adhesion, although the Australian was not quite as fortunate as Martin.

Miller was an early faller at Turn Four but managed to pick up his Pramac Yamaha and ride it back to the pits.

Meanwhile, Marc Marquez was pushing hard to challenge Di Giannantonio’s early benchmark.

The Ducati Lenovo rider was on a lap that appeared capable of matching the leading time when he lost the front at Turn Fifteen, tumbling through the gravel before walking away seemingly unhurt.

Marquez returned to the circuit around ten minutes later, though he ran wide at Turn One moments later.

At the halfway point, Di Giannantonio remained on top ahead of Alex Marquez, Johann Zarco and Bezzecchi.

Enea Bastianini led the KTM riders in fifth, followed by Diogo Moreira, Pedro Acosta and Marc Marquez.

Francesco Bagnaia, the outright MotoGP lap record holder at Sepang, was ninth, while Ai Ogura rounded out the top ten.

Moreira briefly leads before Marquez delivers

The final quarter of the session produced a frenetic battle for the ten direct places in Saturday’s Q2.

With just under sixteen minutes remaining, rookie Diogo Moreira produced a 1m57.913s to briefly take over at the top of the timesheets.

The Honda rider’s advantage would last only fifty seconds.

Marc Marquez then unleashed a stunning 1m57.000s on his thirteenth lap, 45 minutes into the session.

That put the championship leader almost a full second clear of the previous benchmark and established a target that nobody would manage to beat.

His time was just 0.663 seconds outside Bagnaia’s outright Sepang lap record of 1m56.337s, established in 2024. Marc’s lap was recorded on fresh Michelin Soft slicks front and rear.

The order behind him was anything but settled.

Maverick Viñales briefly moved into second, with Bastianini then taking third and Acosta fourth, making it a KTM two-three-four behind Marquez.

However, the orange order was quickly rearranged when Acosta moved into second.

Bezzecchi subsequently split the KTM riders, while Ogura moved into fifth.

With eight minutes left on the clock, Alex Marquez produced a 1m57.109s to claim second, just a tenth behind his older brother.

Di Giannantonio also continued improving, eventually recording a 1m57.442s on his nineteenth and final lap to finish fifth.

Marc returned to the Ducati garage for front suspension adjustments before heading back out on the same tyres with around five minutes remaining.

He did not improve his benchmark, but subsequently recorded laps of 1m58.513s and 1m58.480s on the used Soft slicks.

Ogura produces a remarkable late charge

The closing minutes brought further drama as Bastianini crashed at Turn Two, fortunately walking away unhurt.

Meanwhile, Ai Ogura was on an exceptional lap aboard his Trackhouse Aprilia. The Japanese rider was running fractionally faster than Marquez’s benchmark through the third timing split, having produced the fastest second sector of the entire field at 27.970 seconds. He was 0.033 seconds ahead of Marquez’s corresponding lap at the third split, but lost time in the final sector. Nevertheless, Ogura’s 1m57.167s catapulted him from tenth to third with just over three minutes remaining, leaving him only 0.167 seconds behind the championship leader. That was quite a turnaround for a rider who had finished nineteenth in morning FP1, more than 1.7 seconds from the benchmark.

The final minutes were becoming increasingly frantic.

Johann Zarco crashed at Turn Seven, triggering yellow flags through that section of the circuit.

Bagnaia fell at Turn One while sitting twelfth on the timesheets, ending his chance to qualify directly for Q2.

Moreira also produced a spectacular front-end save at the final corner, but by then the Brazilian had slipped to thirteenth and was facing a trip through Q1.

Marquez brothers lead the way into Q2

When the clocks stopped, it was still Marc Marquez on top with his 1m57.000s, completing a clean sweep of Friday’s MotoGP sessions.

Alex Marquez finished second, just 0.109 seconds behind, reinforcing the outstanding Sepang form that had made him one of the riders to watch heading into the weekend.

Ogura’s late charge secured third, only 0.167 seconds from the top, while Acosta was fourth with a 1m57.380s.

Di Giannantonio finished fifth ahead of Bezzecchi, Bastianini and Viñales.

For Viñales, securing direct passage into Q2 was a welcome breakthrough after his injury-disrupted season.

Franco Morbidelli improved to ninth with a 1m57.582s on his twenty-first and final lap, while Joan Mir claimed the final direct Q2 place in tenth with a 1m57.618s.

Just over six-tenths covered the top ten.

Zarco narrowly missed out in eleventh, with Bagnaia twelfth and Moreira thirteenth.

Alex Rins was the leading Yamaha in fourteenth, followed by Iker Lecuona and Jack Miller.

Four Ducatis, three KTMs, two Aprilias and one Honda secured direct passage into Q2. No Yamaha made the cut.

Michelin Soft tyres dominate the qualifying battle

Michelin brought three rear slick specifications to Sepang, including a new symmetric Medium developed in anticipation of circuit resurfacing work that was ultimately abandoned.

Morning FP1 had seen riders exploring different combinations, with Marc Marquez leading on a Soft front and Medium rear, while Acosta had produced competitive laps on both the Hard and Medium rear options.

However, the decisive afternoon qualifying attacks were undertaken on Soft slicks at both ends of the motorcycle.

All ten riders progressing directly into Q2 set their fastest laps using the Soft-front/Soft-rear combination.

Martin’s championship challenge remains uncertain

The most significant development of Friday, beyond Marquez’s outright pace, remains the contrasting fortunes of the two championship protagonists.

Marquez has topped both sessions, demonstrated the speed to dominate a qualifying attack and recovered from an afternoon crash without any obvious ill effects.

Martin, meanwhile, has completed only limited running while attempting to adapt to the fractured wrist sustained during their Phillip Island Sprint battle.

His remarkable save at Turn Twelve showed that his extraordinary reflexes remain intact, but the decision to end his Friday programme early raises further questions about how much his damaged wrist can tolerate.

Aprilia has left open the possibility of Martin returning on Saturday, but a decision will depend upon how he feels after resting overnight.

If he does return, he will face the additional complication of having to negotiate Q1 before attempting to qualify for the Sprint and Grand Prix.

With ten points separating the championship leaders and four rounds remaining, that is hardly the preparation Martin would have wanted.

Marc Marquez heads into Saturday with a substantial psychological and competitive advantage, but the younger Marquez brother, Ogura, Acosta and the other Q2 qualifiers have shown that he will not have things entirely his own way.

And with the prospect of tropical thunderstorms still looming over the weekend, Sepang may have several more twists in store.

Sepang MotoGP Practice Results

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Moto2 Practice

Manuel Gonzalez responded to Izan Guevara’s morning dominance by topping Friday afternoon Moto2 Practice at Sepang, setting a 2m03.737s benchmark just over four minutes into the session that nobody could beat.

Guevara had finished morning FP1 more than half a second clear of the field, but it was championship leader Gonzalez who established the advantage when the more important afternoon session got underway.

Despite forecasts suggesting thunderstorms could disrupt proceedings, conditions remained dry, although temperatures had climbed considerably. The ambient temperature was 33 degrees, the circuit was at 48 degrees and humidity stood at 62 per cent.

Gonzalez wasted little time making his intentions clear. His second lap was a 2m03.737s, a massive 1.127 seconds quicker than his best time from FP1, when he had finished ninth.

He backed that up with a 2m03.909s on the following lap, and although he would not subsequently improve, that early benchmark proved sufficient to secure top honours.

Alonso Lopez was his closest challenger, also setting his fastest lap on his second lap. The Gresini rider recorded a 2m03.881s, just 0.144 seconds behind Gonzalez, an impressive turnaround after ending morning FP1 in eleventh.

Neither rider would improve on those early laps during the remainder of the session.

Daniel Holgado joined the leading group late in proceedings, improving to a 2m03.943s on his fourteenth lap to take third for CFMOTO Aspar.

Guevara also had to wait until his final run to produce his best time, recording a 2m03.971s on lap twelve to finish fourth.

That meant the championship’s leading pair were separated by 0.234 seconds, with Gonzalez holding the advantage heading into Saturday.

However, the detailed sector analysis reveals that Guevara could potentially have been considerably faster. The BLU CRU Pramac Yamaha rider recorded the fastest individual times through three of the four sectors, with only Alonso Lopez preventing him from completing a clean sweep.

Guevara’s combined best sectors produced a theoretical 2m03.584s, which was 0.153 seconds faster than Gonzalez’s actual session-topping lap.

Gonzalez’s own theoretical best was 2m03.616s, meaning Guevara held a slender 0.032-second advantage when their ideal laps were compared.

Of course, combining those sectors into one lap is another matter altogether, but the analysis suggests Guevara remains very much in contention despite finishing fourth.

Just 5.5 points separate Gonzalez and Guevara in the championship, making their contrasting fortunes across Friday’s sessions particularly interesting.

The leading quartet were all Spaniards, covered by only 0.234 seconds, before a substantial gap of 0.477 seconds back to fifth-placed Tony Arbolino.

Ivan Ortola was sixth ahead of Angel Piqueras and Collin Veijer, while Daniel Muñoz and Taiyo Furusato completed the top ten.

Agius safely through to Q2

Australia’s Senna Agius finished eleventh with a 2m04.644s, improving by 0.317 seconds over his morning benchmark.

The Intact GP rider was 0.907 seconds behind team-mate Gonzalez, but safely inside the top fourteen required to progress directly to Q2.

Agius completed two runs, with his best time coming on his tenth lap, immediately after a lengthy stop in the garage.

His sector performance was encouraging, with a theoretical ideal lap of 2m04.607s, only 0.037 seconds faster than his actual best.

Agius also demonstrated strong straight-line performance, recording a maximum speed of 279 km/h, equal with Filip Salac for the highest figure of the session.

Joe Roberts finished twelfth, just 0.041 seconds behind Agius, while Mario Aji was thirteenth and Adrian Huertas claimed the final direct Q2 position in fourteenth.

The margin at the cut-off was extraordinarily tight.

Huertas and Filip Salac recorded identical 2m04.735s laps, but Huertas secured fourteenth because his second-best valid lap of 2m04.803s was considerably faster than Salac’s next-best 2m05.206s.

That left Salac facing Q1 despite matching the lap time of the final rider to advance directly.

From fifth-placed Arbolino to twentieth-placed Alex Escrig, just 0.330 seconds covered sixteen riders, underlining how fiercely contested the midfield positions had become.

Fellow Australian Jacob Roulstone finished 27th with a 2m06.223s while continuing his substitute appearance with Marc VDS.

Roulstone improved by 0.786 seconds over his morning FP1 best and was third-fastest through the speed trap at 278.3 km/h, but remained 2.486 seconds away from Gonzalez.

His best lap came on his tenth lap, following a lengthy stop in the garage, and was considerably quicker than the 2m07.583s he had recorded early in the session.

Matteo Ferrari completed the classification in 28th.

The afternoon session also saw a number of track-limit infringements recorded at Turns Six, Fourteen and Fifteen.

Gonzalez now holds the early advantage heading into Saturday, but Guevara remains firmly in contention, with the sector analysis suggesting that he has the speed to challenge his title rival.

Meanwhile, Agius has secured direct passage to Q2, while the remarkably close margins among the midfield riders suggest qualifying will be fiercely contested.

Sepang Moto2 Practice Results

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Moto3 Friday Practice

Conditions were considerably hotter for the afternoon Moto3 Practice session at Sepang, with an ambient temperature of 33 degrees, the circuit at 48 degrees and humidity of 58 per cent.

Despite the increased track temperature, the pace was competitive from the outset, with Adrian Fernandez quickly establishing himself at the top of the timesheets.

The Leopard Racing Honda rider recorded a 2m11.589s on only his second lap, just over five minutes into the session, and that benchmark proved surprisingly durable.

At the halfway point, Fernandez continued to lead ahead of Alvaro Carpe and David Muñoz, while newly crowned Moto3 World Champion Maximo Quiles held fourth.

The field remained tightly packed, with less than a second covering the top fifteen riders.

Early in the second half of the session, Quiles had a significant front-end slide, but the Spaniard demonstrated impressive reflexes to save the CFMOTO Aspar KTM and continue without incident.

With the riders returning to the circuit for their final runs, the order began to change considerably.

Home rider Hakim Danish briefly took over at the top with a 2m11.573s, recorded just under 26 minutes into the session.

His advantage lasted only 44 seconds before David Almansa delivered a 2m11.427s to move into first place.

That proved the fastest time of the session, completing a remarkable improvement for the Intact GP rider, who had been only seventeenth in morning FP1.

Almansa improved his best morning lap by 1.279 seconds and was also 0.158 seconds quicker than the benchmark Carpe had established in FP1.

Rico Salmela was another rider to improve significantly, taking second with a 2m11.496s on his eleventh lap, only 0.069 seconds behind Almansa.

The Finnish rider’s combined best sector times suggested even greater potential, with a theoretical 2m11.231s that was faster than anyone else’s ideal lap.

Veda Pratama finished third for Honda Team Asia, only 0.092 seconds from the top, while Danish’s earlier benchmark was good enough to secure fourth and provide a welcome boost for the Malaysian fans.

Fernandez eventually finished fifth, having been unable to improve on his early lap, while Matteo Bertelle made a substantial improvement from nineteenth in morning FP1 to finish sixth.

Morning pace-setter Carpe was seventh, followed by Joel Esteban, Brian Uriarte and Muñoz.

Quiles eventually finished eleventh, just 0.479 seconds from Almansa, after his earlier moment and a session in which he could not quite reproduce his morning speed.

Kelso safely through to Q2

Australia’s Joel Kelso finished twelfth with a 2m11.990s on his ninth lap, 0.563 seconds behind Almansa.

It was 0.149 seconds slower than his best lap from morning FP1, but importantly it was enough to secure direct passage to Q2.

Kelso was only 0.012 seconds ahead of GRYD Racing team-mate Eddie O’Shea, who finished thirteenth, with Scott Ogden taking the final direct qualifying position in fourteenth.

Just 0.052 seconds separated Kelso from the Q2 cut-off, underlining how finely balanced the session had become.

Guido Pini was the first rider to miss direct passage into Q2, finishing fifteenth on 2m12.301s, 0.259 seconds behind Ogden.

All fourteen riders progressing directly to Q2 were covered by just 0.615 seconds.

One of the more surprising results was Marco Morelli’s fall to 22nd after finishing third in morning FP1. The Argentine struggled to produce a clean lap during the afternoon, with repeated track-limit infringements contributing to a frustrating session.

Turns Six and Fourteen proved particularly troublesome across the field, with numerous riders having lap times cancelled after exceeding track limits.

However, the most important development for Kelso was simply securing his place in Q2 without needing to negotiate the earlier qualifying session.

With thunderstorms remaining a possibility over the weekend, that could prove valuable.

The leading Moto3 contenders will now return on Saturday morning to determine the grid for Sunday’s Malaysian Grand Prix.

Moto3 Friday Practice Results

Sepang Moto3 Practice Results

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2026 MotoGP Calendar

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