Martin’s nightmare Barcelona weekend puts him on top of the 2026 crash list, with 16 tumbles. Ogura has had five, Márquez 11, Bezzecchi 12 and Di Giannantonio ten. Ogura has had only one no-score so far, when he had a bike glitch while chasing a podium during the US GP.
Ogura is surely Márquez’s most dangerous rival. The 2024 Moto2 champ is riding superbly, with an apparently effortless, swooping style that seems tailor-made for the Aprilia, which is a corner-speed bike, while the Ducati is a stop-and-go machine.
Ogura also has excellent rear-brake control. Braking and turning is one area where riders can make most of the difference, with no help from reactive rider aids. It’s one of Márquez’s strongest points and explains his ability to attack rivals on corner entry, as does Ogura.
“Ogura, probably from his time in Moto2, uses the rear brake a lot and sometimes he’s able to compensate even better than the other [Aprilia] riders,” adds Sterlacchini.
There was no reason to fear the 25-year-old Japanese until the championship arrived at Brno last month for round nine. Until then Ogura was renowned for qualifying badly and then fighting his way through the pack to make some amends. At the first eight rounds he mostly qualified on the third or fourth rows, which is no good at a time when overtaking in MotoGP is so difficult.
Points leader Martin had a poor weekend, fending off Bezzecchi for fifth
MotoGP
Ogura changed all that at Brno, finding his time-attack ability from within himself, finally getting the best out of soft tyres over one lap. He started from pole at Brno, from second at Assen and from fifth at Sachsenring, which delivered his first podium, for second place, at Brno, his first win at Assen and another second place at Sachsenring. In those three weekends he has more than made up for his so-so earlier results.
From fourth on lap one at Sachsenring he was promoted to third when Alex Márquez fell just before one-third distance. From there he hunted down Fernández, showing more pace than his Trackhouse team-mate. Lap after lap he tried to make the pass, but as Honda’s Luca Marini said, Sachsenring is MotoGP’s Monaco, where overtaking is little short of impossible. Finally Ogura made it through with six laps to go. After that he matched or bettered Márquez’s pace, though the race winner was comfortably controlling the gap.
The Trackhouse pair are simply riding better than factory riders Martin and Bezzecchi, whose season has gone from ecstasy – start-to-finish wins at the first three GPs – to agony.
Things went awry for the early championship leader in Hungary, where he was taken out at the first corner by Martin. He was back in action at Brno, battered and bruised, where he crashed out of the sprint and slapped a marshal who was retrieving his bike from the gravel trap. For that he was thrown out of Sunday’s race. Then from bad to worse – a massive tumble during the Dutch GP and another during German GP qualifying, which fractured his left collarbone.
Bezzecchi is far from out of the championship battle, but he will need some serious mettle to get right back into it after the summer break. In Germany he said his only plan was to get back into the groove after three bruising weekends, but in the end his mind was keener than his body. As other riders opined, when your mind is ready but your body isn’t, it’s easy to make mistakes because your physical reactions lag behind your mental reactions.
Former championship leader Bezzecchi had another nightmare in Germany
Aprilia
Di Giannantonio has been more consistent that any of the others, apart from Ogura, with only two DNFs, from crashing out of the COTA sprint and Sunday’s German GP. He has plenty of speed – he’s qualified on the front row at five of the 11 races, including poles in Brazil and the USA – but he lacks race pace. He finished third at Goiania and Jerez and won at Barcelona but hasn’t been on the podium in the last five GPs.
His strength had been keeping things simple – not changing the bike too much and therefore keeping him intimate with its behaviour. Perhaps his lack of recent results encouraged him to change direction. At Sachsenring he fitted Ducati’s 2026 aero package for the first time, on Saturday evening! Then he crashed out of warm-up and the race.
“I saw Marc and Alex using it and I wanted to try to understand,” he said. “It actually was a little better this morning, so for this reason we decided to continue with it.”
Silverstone next, where, in theory at least, the Aprilia should suit the layout more than the Ducati. Watch out for Ogura.