Sachsenring: Why Alex Marquez and Di Giannantonio Really Crashed

• Alex Marquez crashed out of second place in lap 9 of 30, Fabio Di Giannantonio had already gone down in lap 4
• Marc Marquez won and trails championship leader Jorge Martin by 18 points heading into the summer break
• Marco Bezzecchi underwent surgery on his left collarbone on Sunday morning

The race at the Sachsenring was quickly told: Marc Marquez led from the first lap to the last and celebrated his tenth MotoGP win at this track. More interesting than the race itself were the conversations afterwards. Because two riders who could have stood on the podium instead ended up in the gravel. And both clearly struggled to explain what had actually happened.

How did Alex Marquez crash?

Alex Marquez slipped away at the end of the ninth lap in the final corner, while running second directly behind his brother. He attributes the crash to a small riding mistake and too much confidence in the final sector.

The Gresini rider had been particularly fast in the fourth sector that day and apparently trusted the conditions more than they allowed. The grip level had been lower than the day before, everything overall trickier. He wouldn’t rule out that the wind had also played a role, but put the mistake down to himself. He spoke openly about the situation just before the crash: he had deliberately left a small gap to Marc so the front tyre wouldn’t overheat, while also saving the rear tyre. In exactly the sector where he lost time, he wanted to make it back and ended up loading the front too much.

He said in English: “I’m upset, and quite sad with that crash.” He was nonetheless satisfied with the weekend overall, because he was coming back from injury.

He elaborated on this point further. Alex Marquez had broken his collarbone and a vertebra in Barcelona in May and is still not at one hundred percent physically. In the decisive corners he doesn’t help the bike enough with turning in, because he sits too stiffly on the machine and as a result puts too much weight on the front wheel. He also sees this as a reason for the crash. After the summer break, in Silverstone or at the latest in Motorland, he wants to be fully back.

Why can’t Fabio Di Giannantonio explain his crash?

Fabio Di Giannantonio crashed as early as lap 4 in turn 10 and still finds no explanation in the data. The telemetry of his crash lap was an exact copy of the lap before.

The VR46 rider approached the matter soberly. Suspension, speed, lean angle, throttle position: everything looked identical. That was strange, he said, but part of the sport, because sometimes many small things come together that can’t be cleanly traced. “It was my first mistake of the year,” he said, taking the retirement in his stride. Statistically, something like this had to happen at some point.

For Di Giannantonio, this ended a streak of 17 consecutive Grand Prix finishes that stretched back to Barcelona in the previous season. It was bitter also because he had still been third behind the Marquez brothers in Saturday’s sprint.

Ducati’s aero switch

One technical decision stood out. From warm-up onward, Di Giannantonio used Ducati’s new aerodynamics package for the first time, having still raced the sprint with the older version. Of all things, it was with the new wings that he crashed on Sunday morning in warm-up.

He still doesn’t want the switch to count as the decisive factor for the race crash. He said he had seen Marc and Alex Marquez using this aero package and wanted to try it. In warm-up it immediately felt better. It wasn’t a big risk, he said, because the bike had already worked excellently on Saturday. Had the switch turned out to be wrong, they would simply have gone back and still had a podium-capable package. He explains the warm-up crash with a new line and a new insight into the set-up that he didn’t have before: he had been too far over the limit at the rear. His neck was a bit stiff afterwards, but he didn’t want to complain about it.

What does Marc Marquez say about the championship fight?

Marc Marquez says he no longer fully understands the current championship situation himself. After his win, he lies third in the championship, just 18 points behind Jorge Martin, even though after the Mugello Grand Prix he had still been more than 100 points behind.

He said after the race, in English: “I don’t understand anything.” He gave his explanation right after: they attack where he feels comfortable and try to survive on difficult tracks. Wins in Hungary, the Czech Republic and now in Germany have brought him back into title contention, aided also by Marco Bezzecchi’s run of retirements.

Marquez names a clear weak point. If he wants to fight for the title, he needs to improve his right arm. That’s the only issue holding him back. There are passages where he’s sitting on the bike but can’t work with his body. During the summer break he wants to recover on one hand, because he needs that mentally, and on the other hand work specifically on the arm and, as he puts it, wake up sleeping muscles. If that step succeeds, an attack on the championship in the second half of the season is possible. If it doesn’t, they’ll have to take it weekend by weekend.

On the race itself he said that after building a lead of around two seconds he had simply controlled it from there. He couldn’t clearly answer whether he’d had more in reserve. If nobody applies pressure, you don’t pull anything extra out of yourself either. On the podium he was more emotional: “I’m over the moon! It was a special weekend.” He had already said on Thursday that he had to attack here if he still wanted a title chance. With his tenth win at the Sachsenring he equalled Giacomo Agostini’s track record, who won ten times at Imatra in Finland. Across all classes, both now stand at 13 wins at the German Grand Prix.

How does Jorge Martin explain his fifth place?

Jorge Martin continues to lead the championship but sees no chance against the competition. After finishing fifth, he said openly that Aprilia’s factory team currently can’t keep up with Ducati or even with its own Trackhouse customer bikes.

His lead, he said, was only the result of a strong first half of the season, in which the RS-GP worked excellently and gave a lot of confidence. That has completely turned around. He now finds himself amazed at how stable his direct rivals’ bikes are working, while he can’t find a serious solution front or rear. “So I won’t be championship leader for much longer either,” he said.

The biggest problem, he said, is that the limit can’t be pushed up even slightly without the front instantly sliding away. With that, Martin also offers a possible explanation for his teammate Bezzecchi’s heavy crashes. The summer break comes at exactly the right time, but it won’t be restful. What makes him optimistic is that Trackhouse regularly finishes near the front with the same technical package. That shows the material is fundamentally good.

Ai Ogura and Raul Fernandez talk about their podium

Ai Ogura finished second and with it took over second place in the championship. For the fifth time in six races he finished among the top two. His move on teammate Raul Fernandez came at the start of lap 25 of 30 in turn 1.

Ogura described the battle as difficult but doable. After that he stayed fast enough to hold the position to the finish. He wasn’t sure himself about choosing the medium tyre, but it worked well over the distance. “That was a better result on this Sunday than we could have expected,” he said. Whoever finishes second behind Marc Marquez can be happy with the day.

Raul Fernandez finished third and credits his form to his now-settled future. He said, in English: “My future is almost done.” He feels freer in the last two races and can do what he wants with the bike. The podium is remarkable also because he rode with a painful back injury he picked up on Saturday. Without the Medical Centre, by his own account, he wouldn’t have made the podium at all. Before the race nobody in the team had expected a podium finish, they had rather hoped for a top five.

What does Pedro Acosta say about the race?

Pedro Acosta finished fourth and still voiced clear criticism of how the race unfolded. He called the last ten laps a disaster, because in the end it was only about the tyres surviving.

Up to lap 20 you can enjoy the race reasonably well, he said, after that you just ride clean and try not to overheat the front tyre. As early as lap 10, Marc Marquez, the two Trackhouse Aprilias and himself had already pulled more than four seconds clear. That doesn’t help put on a big show. He called his own result a surprise, especially since he came back from carpal tunnel surgery after Assen. In warm-up a lot was tried and in the end they went back to Saturday’s setting. That the medium rear tyre takes load off the front had been clear beforehand. In his assessment, the first drop in performance came around lap 17, exactly from where he lost touch with Ogura.

On the championship situation, where the top five are within 24 points, he had a clear picture: it feels as if nobody wants to take the lead. Either way, Marc Marquez is still the man to beat. “Right now, the number 1 should be stuck to his bike,” said Acosta, who moves to Ducati in 2027 as Marquez’s teammate.

How is Marco Bezzecchi doing after the surgery?

Marco Bezzecchi underwent successful surgery on his left collarbone on Sunday morning. The procedure took place at the Sassuolo university hospital and was performed by Dr. Giuseppe Porcellini.

Aprilia announced shortly before the start of the race that the break had been set and stabilised. It’s still too early for a precise timeline, but they hope to see Bezzecchi back on the grid at the next Grand Prix in Silverstone from August 7 to 9. A more solid prognosis is expected to follow in the coming days and depends on how the healing goes. A return is therefore not guaranteed. According to initial information, it wasn’t a clean break but a displaced and complicated fracture.

The crash in qualifying, a heavy highside in turn 7, was the provisional low point of a longer rough patch. It began at Balaton Park, when teammate Martin took him out at the start. There followed a crash in the Brno sprint, a penalty for the Czech Grand Prix after slapping a marshal, and a crash at Assen. Bezzecchi himself struck a defiant tone on Instagram, writing that it’s a tough time but that they’re stronger. “Nothing will make me give up,” he wrote there. In the championship he dropped from second to fourth and trails Martin by 22 points.

Marc Marquez and the karma debate

Around Bezzecchi’s crash, a debate arose on social media over whether the injury was a delayed reckoning for earlier incidents. Bezzecchi had collided with Marc Marquez in Indonesia in October of the previous year, causing the shoulder injury that still affects Marquez to this day.

Of all people, it was Marquez who stood up for his rival. He’s been reading the word karma since 2015, he said, and has won six world championships since. If that’s karma, he said, he’s happy to have it. He said, in English: “Karma doesn’t exist.” All riders take big risks. Already in Indonesia, he said, he had publicly asked people not to go after Bezzecchi, because such things simply happen in racing.

Instead of a blame debate, he calls for a concrete consequence. Bezzecchi, as well as Fermin Aldeguer at Assen and Marquez himself in Indonesia, were all injured when they were thrown over the step between the asphalt and the gravel. That, he said, is a point where something can change for the future. Alex Marquez offered an additional explanation on this: someone who isn’t physically at one hundred percent has the head and the speed, but the body doesn’t keep up. That’s exactly when mistakes happen that you don’t expect. He traces his own Assen crash back to the same pattern.

Where does the championship stand before the summer break?

After eleven of 22 rounds, Jorge Martin leads with 208 points. Behind him follow Ai Ogura with 194 and Marc Marquez with 190 points, then Bezzecchi with 186 and Di Giannantonio with 184 points.

That puts the top five riders within 24 points of each other, which is less than the haul from a single Grand Prix weekend. Di Giannantonio drew a positive conclusion from the first half of the season despite the retirement, pointing to consistent results, podiums and a win. Raul Fernandez, sixth in the championship and 49 points back, doesn’t want to write off his title chances as long as the numbers allow it, but won’t commit to anything either. Acosta, meanwhile, has slipped out of the tightest group in seventh, but sees fewer mistakes on his own part than last year and blames technical issues for lost points.

Racing continues after just under four weeks off, in Silverstone. Until then, one question above all remains open: whether Marc Marquez can use the time to bring his right arm far enough that the comeback mode turns into a genuine title fight.

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