On the day his older brother Marc was injured in a collision with Marco Bezzecchi, Alex Marquez extended his MotoGP points advantage over Francesco Bagnaia to 88, aiming for a historic one-two victory in the Marquez World Championship.
However, the Gresini rider was unable to activate the front holeshot device and feared he had said ‘bye-bye’ to his race before it even started.
“The start of the race was really bad. I didn’t activate the front device so I said ‘bye-bye’ to the race,” he revealed.
“Fortunately, I got off to a pretty good start, but I still lost a few positions.”
Despite Marc and Bezzecchi dropping out first on the opening lap, he moved up to eighth place, one place below the grid position.
“I didn’t know where I was on the first lap. I was just trying to be consistent and not make any mistakes,” he said.
2025 Indonesia MotoGP, Alex Marquez lost in the pack on the opening lap
“The podium seemed so far away, but with each lap I suddenly thought, “The group is there.”
Marquez, who moved into seventh place after Joan Mir’s fall, passed Fabio Quartararo on lap 10, Luca Marini on lap 14, Raul Fernández on lap 15, Pedro Acosta on lap 22 and Alex Rins on lap 23 of 27.
“I was on the train of Yamaha, Quartararo and Rins, and at first it was impossible to overtake them because the rear was soft and super fast,” he explained.
“But then I started passing and I felt a little bit better. I did everything patiently. I just tried not to make mistakes.”
Rins’ pass moved Márquez into second place behind teammate Fermin Aldeguer, who ran out of control with a few laps to go.
However, Acosta fought back and Marquez ended a difficult weekend in third place.
2025 Indonesia MotoGP: Alex Marquez leads Pedro Acosta in battle for second place
“In the last two laps Pedro was faster than me,” Alex admitted. “He passed me and I said, given all the problems that happened this weekend, the podium is fine.
“It’s a good result. We suffered a lot here last year.
“In theory, this was one of my weakest tracks here at Mandalika, so we saved it in a really good way.”
With Bagnaia missing the score in both races at Mandalica, Alex can afford to lose an average of 21 points to the Ducati factory rider over the final four rounds and still claim second place.
“We won a lot of important points in our second championship. Now we have to look forward to the game against Australia,” he said.
Australian MotoGP will be held from October 17th to 19th.