2026 Qatar MotoGP practice: Marc Marquez leads FP1, Bezzecchi just 0.110s behind

Marc Marquez led the opening free practice session for round 20 of the 2026 MotoGP season at Lusail on November 6. The Ducati Lenovo rider set a 1:52.278, with Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi only 0.110 seconds behind. Fabio Di Giannantonio placed third, 0.413 seconds off the fastest time.

Official timing records show Marquez completed 16 laps and set his best time on lap 15. Bezzecchi also completed 16 laps, recording his fastest on the last one. Both riders therefore produced their best laps late in their respective runs, leaving the final gap close to a tenth of a second.

Pedro Acosta finished fourth, 0.677 seconds behind, putting Ducati, Aprilia and KTM in the top four. Jorge Martin was fifth in 1:53.012, ahead of Francesco Bagnaia. Raul Fernandez, Luca Marini, Franco Morbidelli and Johann Zarco completed the top ten, with Ai Ogura eleventh.

There were several interruptions to individual riders’ work. In its account of the session, Motorsport-Magazin reported that Honda stand-in Jake Dixon had a severe wobble at Turn 11 early on before crashing at Turn 15. Brad Binder subsequently fell at Turn 7, while Acosta stopped with a technical problem late in the session.

All three retained valid times in the final classification. Dixon completed 13 laps and was eighteenth in 1:55.426. Binder completed 14 and finished thirteenth in 1:53.631, while Acosta logged 15 laps and held fourth. Those incidents and the fastest laps each rider ultimately recorded are separate parts of the session’s outcome.

The session took place in clear, dry conditions, with official records listing an air temperature of 34°C and a track temperature of 42°C. Friday’s timed Practice is scheduled to start at 19:00 in Qatar, midnight on November 7 in Beijing. The move from daylight to night running means FP1 alone cannot establish the order for the next session.

Full FP1 classification