MotoGP practice results with Marco Bezzecchi fastest after Alex Marquez’s red flag crash at Dutch GP

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Marco Bezzecchi ended practice at the Dutch Grand Prix with the fastest time of the session, following Alex Marquez’s crash that brought out a red flag in the latter stages.

After being banned from starting the Czech Grand Prix due to an incident in the Brno Sprint race, Marco Bezzecchi returned to action in Assen by clocking the fastest time of Friday morning’s FP1 session.

While conditions in the north of the Netherlands were warm during the first practice session of the weekend, the afternoon pre-qualifying practice session was sweltering, with temperatures reaching upwards of 35 degrees Celsius at the TT Circuit.

Despite the lap record being smashed during practice last time out in Czechia, the warmer track temperatures in Assen meant that Francesco Bagnaia’s 2024 feat of a 1:30.540 remained safe until qualifying on Saturday at the very least.

• READ MORE: Dutch Grand Prix 2026: How to watch, MotoGP race and qualifying times, and Assen weather forecast

Marco Bezzecchi set the pace in practice as Alex Marquez brought out a red flag

As the afternoon time attack got underway in Assen, VR46’s Fabio Di Giannantonio was the first rider to stake his claim for the top spot of the timing sheets with a time just over six tenths adrift of Bezzecchi’s morning benchmark.

The lap times quickly plunged, with the Italian rider getting back into the groove after a few laps and reclaiming the top spot of the session ahead of KTM’s Pedro Acosta and Bezzecchi’s factory Aprilia teammate, Jorge Martin.

Martin would go on to set the fastest time of the session so far with around 35 minutes left on the stopwatch, with MotoGP rookie Toprak Razgatlioglu putting himself in contention to compete in Q2 with the ninth fastest time on the grid.

The Aprilia riders then began to flex their muscles after the midway point of the session. Ai Ogura snatched the top spot as Raul Fernandez slotted into P3 to provide a provisional one-two-three-four for the Noale-based manufacturer.

Reigning world champion Marc Marquez looked to struggle for pace in the extreme heat at Assen, and was some 1.4s off the pace in P14 after the first 40 minutes of the session. However, once the time attacks began, he quickly became more competitive.

The first yellow flag of the session was brought out with 15 minutes to go, after Fermin Aldeguer suffered a nasty incident between turns 11 and 12. The Spaniard slipped off the bike and into the gravel, which flicked him up into the air and back down again several times.

After race control flagged that the young Murcian rider was taken to the medical centre, Aprilia continued to show their dominance in the last sector of the TT Circuit. While some riders looked to dethrone them, the final portion of the lap remained out of reach.

Martin brought out more yellow flags with a handful of minutes to go, before a red flag was thrown for an Alex Marquez crash at turn 11. Race control flagged that the Spaniard was conscious, but looked to be in some considerable pain as he hobbled off the circuit.

Bezzecchi ended the session on top of the timesheets, with Fernandez and Acosta rounding out the top three.

• READ MORE: Dutch Grand Prix predictions as MotoGP experts decide if Marco Bezzecchi can end Marc Marquez’s run

Full 2026 MotoGP Dutch Grand Prix practice timesheets