Marc Marquez left the Jerez MotoGP test feeling positive after evaluating new aerodynamic and chassis developments on his Ducati, citing improved front-end confidence—a key area he has been seeking to enhance since the start of the season. The reigning world champion, who crashed out of Sunday’s Spanish Grand Prix and now trails title leader Marco Bezzecchi by 44 points, was the fastest Ducati rider at the test, finishing just behind a trio of Aprilias with a best lap of 1m36.277s in the afternoon session.
Despite his race-day disappointment, Marquez joked that his early exit left him fresher for Monday’s workload, completing 68 laps and declaring his physical condition as “okay.”
Technically, the test focused on a revised fairing, new swingarm aero, and a modified chassis. “I started to feel a bit more confident with the front, especially in the left corners, which was normally one of my strong points and I was struggling there during these first races,” Marquez explained. “And right corners also, we improved a bit. So basically, we don’t lose the strong points, and we gained a bit in the weak points.”
Team manager Davide Tardozzi confirmed that aerodynamics were the main priority for the test. “We investigate a lot the aerodynamic area because it seems that is one of the possibilities we have to improve the bike and honestly we found something. Marc is happy about this new configuration. While on the other side, Pecco [Bagnaia] still has some question marks,” Tardozzi told MotoGP.com.
Tardozzi elaborated on the different challenges faced by their two star riders: “Pecco would like to improve the brake area and the entry of the corner, while Marc is more the fast corner speed. So we tried to find something for both of them. Again, on Marc’s side, maybe yes. On Pecco’s side, we’ll see.”
Bagnaia, who also failed to finish Sunday’s race due to a technical issue, ended the test tenth overall, 0.727s behind Ai Ogura. He was cautiously optimistic: “Quite satisfied about some items. The aerodynamics package is working well, so it’s clear that we need more time to understand everything and the team need to analyse everything, but quite confident that today we did a little step. We just need more now to be more focused on stopping the bike. And today we tried something, maybe we found a direction. So, for Le Mans, I hope that we will have something to improve.”
As Ducati continues its development push, Marquez’s encouraging feedback signals progress as the team looks to close the gap in the championship and return to winning ways at the upcoming French Grand Prix in Le Mans.
