Marco Bezzecchi knew he was taking a risk, but he also knew he wasn’t ready. So he did what most MotoGP riders don’t, saying no to a step up that was the right opportunity, but at the wrong time.
It’s the sort of career sliding doors moment that can torpedo a rider’s upwards trajectory, but Bezzecchi held out for something that was better and more suitable, and when he was ready to embrace change.
Eighteen months later, he found it.
Every MotoGP qualifying, practice and race LIVE and ad-break free from lights out to the chequered flag. New to Kayo? Start Your Free Trial Today >
The Italian rider raised eyebrows when, his market value at its peak after three victories in his MotoGP sophomore season of 2023 for the VR46 satellite Ducati team run by mentor Valentino Rossi, he turned down the chance to ride a full-factory Ducati for the Italian factory’s official customer team Pramac Racing, alongside incumbent Jorge Martin.
While he had his reasons, it was a move that was questioned at the time, even more so when his 2024 campaign didn’t kick on from the previous year, and when Pramac – with Martin – won the riders’ title.
Given a second opportunity to leave the Rossi nest, Bezzecchi swallowed hard and took the plunge, signing with Aprilia for 2025-26 to partner with – ironically – Martin, who had rage-quit Ducati after being overlooked for Marc Marquez at its factory team.
MORE MOTOGP NEWS
‘I CANNOT DO MIRACLES’ Bagnaia’s struggles explained, and why his unique situation hurts him
CHAMP CONFIRMS EXIT PLAN Martin’s bombshell statement on Aprilia tenure
It was a move that, on paper, had Bezzecchi playing second-fiddle to the sport’s reigning champion, but one that has, as things have turned out, pushed him to centre-stage.
With Martin injured twice in pre-season, again when he made it back for Qatar in round four and now trying to get out of his own two-year deal with Aprilia 18 months early, Bezzecchi has fallen into an unlikely role as Aprilia’s north star.
His victory last time out at Silverstone – a triumph bookended by Aprilia issuing a statement before the British Grand Prix weekend that was adamant Martin’s contract was binding, and Martin responding in the days following Bezzecchi’s win that he intends to use the contract’s fine print to move on – was some timely good news for the Italian brand and its CEO, Massimo Rivola.
More than that, it showed Aprilia that – maybe, just maybe – it has the on-track leader Martin doesn’t want to be, at least not for KTM, Ducati or Aprilia, the three destinations he’s either wriggled out of contracts with, moved on from or where he’s publicly admitted to a case of buyer’s remorse.
Bezzecchi hasn’t yet – and might not – achieve what Martin has on track. Off it, he might be what a factory in an uncomfortable position not of its own making needs.
FAST RIDER, SLOW BURN
Trying to make sense of Bezzecchi is an exercise in parking your normal expectations for riders who are paid handsomely to be in a hurry. By world championship standards, the 26-year-old is more of a slow burn than riders who come into sport and expect to win yesterday, and become irrationally agitated if they don’t.
Competing full-time in Moto3 for the first time in 2017, Bezzecchi took 15 races to finish on a podium and 20 to win a race before he finished third in the standings in 2018. He graduated to Moto2, had just two top-10 finishes in year one, then earned back-to-back top-four championship finishes in 2020-21 before moving up to the premier class with Rossi’s Ducati team, finishing 14th overall as a rookie in 2022.
The 2023-spec Bezzecchi was a different animal, though. On the podium in the first race of the year in Portugal, the Italian won next time out at the notoriously low-grip Termas de Rio Hondo circuit in Argentina, and added further victories in France and a searingly-hot Indian Grand Prix later in the season en route to finishing third in the standings.
PIT TALK PODCAST: In the latest episode of Pit Talk, hosts Renita Vermeulen and Matt Clayton review Marco Bezzecchi’s win for Aprilia at an action-packed British Grand Prix, discuss Fabio Quartararo’s heartache for Yamaha, look at Jack Miller’s role in Yamaha’s resurgence, and celebrate the first world championship victory for Aussie Moto2 young gun, Senna Agius.
Pramac Racing, then Ducati’s primary customer team, came calling as it needed a replacement for Honda-bound Johann Zarco, but Bezzecchi couldn’t bring himself to leave his mentor and the environment he’d grown up in, much as he saw the benefits.
“It was not an easy decision because, when you have the possibility to get a factory bike, it’s always very interesting,” he said after re-signing with VR46 in September 2023.
“To be honest, from my point of view the human side of the team was very important to me. I built up a relationship over many years with these guys that for me is something very, very important to perform in this way.
“I was not sure that I was able to build such a strong relationship with another team in not a lot of time, because now in MotoGP we have to perform very quickly.
“It was a bit easier to decide to stay in this team. To see ‘Vale’ [Rossi] so interested in me, pushing me to stay, for me was very important … because in the end Vale is Vale. He has believed in me since many years ago [and] without him it was not possible to arrive in the world championship.”
For some, Bezzecchi’s shunning of a brighter spotlight and more responsibility – and a larger pay packet – was seen as capping his career ceiling, a rider who was happy simply to be there and didn’t have that final percentage point of ruthlessness to turn his unquestioned talent into titles. For those who know Bezzecchi, it wasn’t a surprise.
In a paddock of uptight personalities and burning ambitions that can blur the line between reality and fantasy, Bezzecchi stands out. There’s always a quip or comment waiting to get out in the middle of an earnest media debrief in his second language. He’ll do things his way; at Silverstone last time out, he turned up with a mullet haircut and with a one-off helmet for the British GP that was, of all things, a tribute to punk band the Sex Pistols, whose heyday came long before Bezzecchi was born.
On track, Bezzecchi’s flowing style and atypical body language on the bike can make him absolutely mesmerising when he’s in the groove, particularly on tracks where the grip is inconsistent or less than optimal. It’s a zone he can get to only occasionally, but when he does, you wonder how he’s not a threat to win every race. He’s never going to be metronomically consistent, but his high points can make him look like the best rider on the grid with an effortless turn of pace.
For Aprilia – with three of its four riders new for 2025 and with Martin looking for the exits – it might be the perfect marriage, a temporary feel-good shot of serotonin at a tough time for the factory, and a change of address that Bezzecchi realised he needed after all.
“It was a difficult decision, but I think it was the time for me to find some new challenges,” he said of his move away from Rossi’s team to Aprilia.
“I wanted to be a factory rider really badly, so when Aprilia gave me the possibility I decided to approach this new chapter.
“At the end, I didn’t reset my mentality or my targets. I just knew it was going to take some time and was going to take some work. I just tried to not give up, even if everything was looking sad because we passed some sad days.
“The maximum you can do is try to keep yourself close to the people that know what you are capable of. You try to not do it, but sometimes you also doubt yourself when nothing is going well.
“It wasn’t easy, but fortunately I have so many good people around me, starting with my team but also all the [VR46] Academy, Valentino [Rossi] … but also my close friends. I’m a normal 26-year-old guy, with my friends I can speak about everything.”
SILVERSTONE WIN A REWARD FOR STEPPING UP
Bezzecchi’s Silverstone Grand Prix victory continued MotoGP’s curious 2025 season, where Ducati’s domination – it has five of the top six riders in the standings – is juxtaposed with a rollicking run of five different riders winning the past five Grands Prix from Austin to England.
It was also, if you looked closely, not a surprise in the slightest.
MORE MOTOGP NEWS
‘IMPOSSIBLE TO CONTINUE’ Inside MotoGP’s odd one out as star ultimatum lights fuse
AUSSIE’S ADVICE Miller call that almost broke Yamaha’s win drought, and the reward for his impact
In Saturday’s Silverstone sprint, Bezzecchi, from 11th on the grid, sunk to 19th on lap one after his Aprilia RS-GP’s front holeshot device got stuck after the start and cost him several seconds on the run through the first sector of the opening lap.
In the nine remaining laps, Bezzecchi stormed through the field to fourth place and finished just six-tenths of a second off the podium, which boded well for the 20-lap Grand Prix distance the following day.
Silverstone’s long, flowing corners have always suited the nimble Aprilia machine, which tends to struggle more on tracks with 90-degree stop-and-go type turns and with straight-line speed relative to its rivals. The factory’s first MotoGP podium came at Silverstone when Aleix Espargaro finished third in 2021, while Espargaro’s teammate Maverick Vinales was second in 2022 before Espargaro won the British Grand Prix a year later.
Bezzecchi’s pace was such that a repeat wasn’t out of the question, but he needed a much better start. After the initial race was red-flagged because of oil on the track following a lap one accident between Espargaro, now with Honda as a test rider, and Ducati’s Franco Morbidelli, Bezzecchi climbed two places on the opening lap of the restart and kept moving through the pack, overtaking Yamaha’s Jack Miller for second on lap six.
That alone would have been a superb result for a rider who had a season-best of sixth place (in Thailand and Austin) from the opening six rounds of the season, but on lap 12, when runaway leader Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha) was forced into retirement by his bike’s rear ride-height device failing to disengage, Bezzecchi was in the lead of a race for the first time since his Indian Grand Prix win of 2023.
Eight laps later, Grand Prix win number four was his – and Aprilia’s appetite for good news after being so publicly shunned by Martin was sated.
“It’s difficult to explain all the emotions that are going inside my head and my body,” Bezzecchi beamed.
“The first win with Aprilia … I’m very happy and proud because they believed in me, and I wanted to change [from Ducati]. We believed in each other for this project.
“From the fourth row [of the grid] it’s never easy and we are still struggling in some points, like the time attack [qualifying], for example. Yesterday I tried my best but this was the maximum I could achieve. I was confident for my pace today, and the target was to try to make a better start. Fortunately I did it and I wasn’t in a rush, I tried to recover with calm.
“When I come to second place, I just tried to put my pace and I was quick, but Fabio was really far. Then unfortunately for him but luckily for me, he broke the bike. It’s shame for him, but it’s like this.
“It’s a very great moment for everyone in the team and in the factory in Noale [Aprilia’s factory base in Italy]. They never give up and it has been a tough time, we cannot say [it’s] not.
“Finally, a good day has come.”
The victory meant that, other than Ducati, Aprilia is now the only factory to win at least one Grand Prix in each of the past four seasons. And it also brings into question what a Martin-less Aprilia factory outfit might look like if the Spaniard gets his way and, as looks likely, moves on.
The factory Honda seat currently occupied Bezzecchi’s compatriot and former VR46 teammate Luca Marini, who is out of contract at the end of 2025, appears to be Martin’s most likely target given the lack of available options at Yamaha, and the impossibility of him riding again for KTM or Ducati based on past alliances that went bad or he walked away from.
Marini’s technical ability – the 27-year-old is renowned as one of the grid’s foremost intellectual minds – would surely be an asset for Aprilia if he becomes available, particularly as the sport begins to focus on the 850cc regulations that come into place for the 2027 season and will act as something of a hard reset for the competitive order.
Japanese rookie Ai Ogura, the 2024 Moto2 champion who is seven rounds into his rookie premier-class season with Aprilia customer team Trackhouse Racing, could be an equally intriguing option, if an inexperienced one. With most other riders on contracts that expire at the end of 2026, other options to replace Martin from the current grid are limited.
Neither of Marini or Ogura scream natural team leader, but maybe that’s a role Aprilia don’t need to look elsewhere for. In a time of uncertainty, Bezzecchi’s Silverstone win was worth more than the 25 points that came with it for the riders’ championship.
It’s something Aprilia CEO Rivola acknowledged as the celebratory champagne flowed freely in the Silverstone paddock.
“The good news is that we thought we were right, and now we proved that we were right,” Rivola said.
“When you pass quite a difficult time, maybe you start to doubt that you’re not following the right way, and in Noale you prepare people quite hard to work night and day. Having such a big effort paid off by such a big result, it’s a big boost. That’s the most important thing. Today we proved the bike can win, but we must do it many more times.
“I’m super happy for Marco, because he is someone who gives everything he has every day, into the bike, and also off the bike. After the last race he sent a video message to distribute to all the guys saying ‘keep pushing’.
“To feel that kind of responsibility is a big motivation.”