Bezzecchi, an avoidable crash: "Here's what happened." But Aprilia can still smile

Bezzecchi disappointed by the unexpected early crash in the MotoGP sprint race at Buriram: he wants to bounce back on Sunday.

He was the big favorite to win, but on the second lap of the Thailand Sprint he crashed at Turn 8 and threw away the first points of the 2026 MotoGP championship. Marco Bezzecchi was in the lead and battling with Marc Marquez when he made the fatal mistake. The disappointment is huge, because he could have won and led the standings. Aprilia was really strong, as evidenced by the results of Raul Fernandez (third), Ai Ogura (fourth), and Jorge Martin (fifth). Sunday brings the long race and a chance for redemption.

Bezzecchi regrets not making the most of his potential today at Buriram and told Sky Sport MotoGP about his crash: "It was a small mistake, but not from overconfidence. We’d been passing each other for a while and I wanted to try to grab a few meters of advantage. To exit Turn 9 well, I touched the inner white line a bit. The track was a bit trickier today and as soon as I touched it, I felt the front fold; when I got on the gas to try to save it, it folded completely and I crashed. A pity, we’ll try to make up for it on Sunday."

The mistake happened and it was avoidable, but the Rimini rider doesn’t want to dwell on it and is ready to focus on redemption in the long race: "In the end, it’s a fine line between being a phenomenon and being an idiot. Sometimes you’re a phenomenon, like this morning when I took pole position; sometimes you’re the other guy, like this afternoon... Anyway, it’s all experience, and luckily it happened in the sprint, where you lose a few less points. All we can do is get back to work and do better on Sunday. It’ll be important to stay calm, despite the mistake."

Sunday’s scenario will be even more complicated at Buriram and, even as the favorite again, Bezzecchi knows he’ll have to sweat for any potential win: "It’ll be much tougher because it’s much longer, and fuel consumption here is really high. The medium rear gives the bike a bit more stability, which can help us, but it won’t make a huge difference. It’ll be a survival race—doing 26 laps in a row in this heat with maximum tire wear will be difficult. But we’re here to fight."

With Bez out of contention, Raul Fernandez was the top Aprilia rider in the Buriram sprint, a podium that gives him a lot of confidence: "I still don’t have everything under control — he told Sky Sport MotoGP — I’m still missing something. I’m not doing 100% of what I want; I need to work a bit more. This year we’re using our heads a lot. We had a good pre-season and a good start to the GP. We need to stay calm; we know we can keep improving. I’ll say it clearly: we’re not title contenders. When we can, we’re up there; otherwise we gain experience."

The Trackhouse Racing rider doesn’t want to get carried away after today’s great result in Thailand: "I don’t want to think about the championship; it’s not realistic. Finishing top 5 or top 7 in the standings would be an incredible result—that should be the target. Marco is a title contender and I think his bike has something extra, but that’s not a criticism. He can fight a bit more, but that’s no excuse. Maybe today we went with too conservative a strategy. For tomorrow I think I’ll aim for fourth-fifth-sixth place."

Fernandez appears more mature and ready to be a protagonist in MotoGP, and he explained why, not only due to greater experience and Aprilia’s level: "In the last two years I got hurt during testing, so the start of the season was very difficult for me. This year we had a good meeting with Davide Brivio and Fabiano Sterlacchini, and we said it wasn’t important to be strong in testing, but to be ready for the race. That’s what changed; we didn’t change the bike much."

Behind the Spaniard came his teammate Ogura and Martin, a sign of the RS-GP26’s high competitiveness at Buriram. There is disappointment over Bezzecchi’s mistake, but the results of the other riders certainly made Aprilia happy today.