Getting food poisoning from a dodgy chicken dinner probably isn’t the best way to purge yourself of a season that was going nowhere.
But for Enea Bastianini, the former Ducati factory rider who was floundering in his first year with KTM, his 2025 campaign can be seen as one in two parts.
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Rounds 1-10 pre-chicken, and rounds 12-15 since heading into this weekend’s San Marino Grand Prix.
It may be coincidental, but a leaner, meaner Bastianini has started to resemble the rider KTM signed when Ducati moved on from the Italian to promote Marc Marquez for this season.
After scoring 42 points in the first 10 rounds of the year to sit in a miserable 15th place in the world championship – Bastianini hadn’t finished that low in a season where he’s been fully fit since his rookie year of 2021 – the 27-year-old was hospitalised in the lead-up to the German Grand Prix in July with what was initially thought to be appendicitis, but turned out to be something more left-field.
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A bacteria known as campylobacter from a chicken dish sparked a brutal bout of gastro that saw Bastianini bed-ridden and lose three kilograms, meaning he watched the Sachsenring round from afar. In true MotoGP rider style, Bastianini was on track five days later in Brno for the Czech Republic Grand Prix’s opening practice session; with limited energy and next-to-no preparation, his season rapidly began to turn around.
From 11th on the grid, ‘The Beast’ ripped his way through the pack to third in the Saturday sprint, and was on course to do likewise in the Grand Prix the next day before crashing out from fourth place on lap seven. A season-best fifth on the grid next time out in Austria led to a fifth-place Grand Prix finish.
In Hungary, he qualified fourth before a stuck ride-height device saw him crash into Honda’s Johann Zarco on lap one of the sprint, while he had a scary first-lap fall in the Grand Prix the next day when he miraculously avoided being collected by the pursuing pack as he slid across one of the Balaton Park circuit’s chicanes.
The speed was there before the results, and Bastianini belatedly delivered on his promise last weekend in Barcelona with a fifth-place sprint finish before his first Grand Prix podium with KTM 24 hours later in third place.
Bastianini was the only rider within sight of leading pair Alex and Marc Marquez at the flag – he finished 5.5secs adrift, eight seconds ahead of fourth-placed Pedro Acosta – and made the move of the race when he passed fellow KTM rider Acosta into turn one with an outrageous late-braking manoeuvre that left his rear tyre completely off the ground, one that impressed new Tech3 KTM boss Guenther Steiner.
What’s behind Bastianini’s turnaround? Becoming more comfortable with his new bike is part of it – he lamented earlier this season that his seating position on the bike didn’t feel right as KTM’s off-season financial turmoil meant new, needed parts were slow to arrive – while he’s learning to get his RC16 machine into a sweet spot that maximises his one almost supernatural strength.
Tyre conservation and blistering late-race pace are Bastianini’s calling cards and the backbone of his seven MotoGP victories, the most recent of which came at this weekend’s venue of Misano in the Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix of 2024.
In the heart of a mid-season purple patch, Bastianini went with runaway series leaders Jorge Martin and Francesco Bagnaia last September, kept up a pace that contributed to Bagnaia crashing out, and then ambushed Martin with a last-lap block pass that tiptoed the edge of acceptable physical contact to win.
In the past four rounds, Bastianini has doubled his season points tally to 84, overtaken teammate Maverick Vinales to sit 12th in the standings, and comes to the track that’s down the road from his hometown of Rimini with a record that suggests a repeat of that Catalunya podium or better could be in the offing.
In five previous MotoGP starts at Misano, Bastianini has a 100 per cent podium record, even managing a pair of third places in his 2021 rookie season that didn’t hit great heights anywhere else on a third-string Ducati for the tiny Avintia satellite team, coming from outside the top 10 on the grid both times.
Bastianini is never going to be confused with a MotoGP metronome, and his 2025 situation must sting when he looks at what Marquez has done with the team he was ejected from before he landed at KTM. But as a one-off threat on a one-off weekend at a circuit where he’s shone time and time again? Bastianini will surely be prominent this weekend, provided he considers his dinner options more carefully than usual.
Here’s your Insider’s Guide to round 15 of the MotoGP season, with the 27-lap San Marino Grand Prix set for 10pm AEST on Sunday after the 13-lap sprint race at 11pm Saturday AEST.
Bastianini comes to his beloved Misano off his first podium for KTM last Sunday in Barcelona. (AP Photo/Joan Monfort)Source: AP
NEW YAMAHA BREAKS COVER AS MILLER STAYS TIGHT-LIPPED
Yamaha unveiled the V4 engine configuration version of its YZR-M1 machine in the Misano paddock on Thursday, with test rider Augusto Fernandez racing the bike this weekend as the Japanese manufacturer looks towards a full-time entry for the machine in 2026.
Since Suzuki withdrew from MotoGP at the end of 2022, Yamaha has been the only manufacturer to persist with an inline-four configuration bike. While good enough to propel Fabio Quartararo to the 2021 world championship, Yamaha has been left behind by Ducati in particular since, and hasn’t won a Grand Prix since Quartararo’s victory in Germany in July 2022.
Fernandez didn’t make a media appearance on Thursday at Misano, while Yamaha’s regular riders – Jack Miller among them – were barred from speaking about the V4 machine, which the Australian, Quartararo and the Frenchman’s teammate Alex Rins all tried on Monday in Barcelona in a one-day private test after the Catalan Grand Prix.
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While Miller did admit the marque’s regular riders won’t race the V4 version of the Yamaha this year as had been previously suggested – “it ain’t happening, there’s no chance,” he said – all three riders being retained for next year will ride the V4 again in the one-day Monday test that follows the San Marino GP.
In a press release announcing the V4’s arrival, Yamaha said: “The sole purpose of the wildcard is data gathering, no bike development decisions will be based on this weekend’s results.”
Miller, meanwhile, will look for at least a repeat of his eighth-place finishes in both the sprint and Grand Prix at Misano a year ago, after last weekend’s main race in Barcelona was ruined by being barged into a gravel trap on the opening lap, falling to last place before recovering to 14th.
The 30-year-old has regularly been rapid at Misano – he has a pole position (2022) and fourth other front-row starts to his credit – but is yet to finish better than fifth (2021) in 12 world championship outings at the track.
“I think we can have a strong one this weekend … Yamaha can perform well on a circuit without crazy-long straights,” he said.
“The bike felt good last week – well, as good as a motorbike can feel around Barcelona with the grip conditions – but I’m looking forward to see what we can extract out of the M1.
“Grip conditions here are generally pretty high the last few years, and I think the layout plays a little bit more into our hands than some of the other circuits.”
Yamaha’s new V4-engined version of its YZR-M1 machine broke cover in Misano on Thursday. (Yamaha Motor Racing Srl)Source: Supplied
BAGNAIA’S MODEST AIMS AFTER BARCELONA ‘NIGHTMARE’
Two-time world champion Francesco Bagnaia is hoping a return to the track where he first began to make his MotoGP name could be a good omen in a season where he’s been completely eclipsed by new teammate Marc Marquez as his own form has nosedived.
Bagnaia, the 2022 and 2023 champion for Ducati, won 11 Grands Prix a year ago before narrowly losing a chance at a rare championship three-peat at the 2024 season finale in Barcelona to Jorge Martin.
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In 30 starts across all sprints and Grands Prix this season, the 28-year-old has just one victory – inherited when Marquez crashed out of a comfortable lead in Austin in round three – and arrives at Misano after his worst qualifying in over three years last weekend in Catalunya, when he started from 21st place on a 24-rider grid.
By contrast, Marquez, with 24 wins from 30 starts, begins the weekend on 487 championship points, within reach of the all-time single-season points record (Martin’s 508 last year) since the advent of the sprint race era in 2023, and with six rounds remaining after Misano.
Bagnaia took his first MotoGP podium at Misano in 2020, won his second premier-class Grand Prix there a year later, and hasn’t finished off the podium in a San Marino Grand Prix since.
On Thursday, the Italian said he would set his sights on a top-five finish on Sunday, a week after he finished a credible seventh from the back row of the grid in Barcelona.
“Right now, I don’t want to say that I’m happy [and] I don’t want to say that I’m angry,” he said.
“The last GP was a disaster, a nightmare for me, like the one in [Hungary]. I just need a normal race weekend, and a good result could be a fantastic moment right now.
“I know that I’m here to win races, I’m here in the factory team because I can fight for wins. Right now, the potential is not there. I tried everything to adapt to this bike, but right now I’m still struggling to do it.”
Misano, with its high-grip asphalt, is the polar opposite to the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya’s slippery track layout, a seven-year-old surface that offers less traction than any track on the calendar.
Bagnaia hopes that can overcome his continued lack of front-end feeling with Ducati’s GP25 machine over its predecessor, which saw him lead 259 race laps last year compared to just 18 in 15 rounds this season.
“It will be important for me to have more grip because last weekend was quite tricky,” he said.
“I was struggling a lot to find some support from the rear, so it’s super useful.
“I looked at every single direction possible and the only reason for my difficulty is that this bike has a different DNA that I’m still not able to adapt to. Some bikes are better, some bikes are more difficult, but it depends on the way you can adapt to it. Unluckily with this bike, I’m struggling more.”
Bagnaia’s strong record at Misano offers some comfort for a season that started slowly, and has only snowballed. (Photo by GABRIEL BOUYS / AFP)Source: AFP
MARQUEZ EYEING EARLY START TO 2026 ONCE TITLE SECURED
Marc Marquez having his 15-race winning streak ended by younger brother Alex Marquez in Barcelona last Sunday meant the championship will remain live until the Japanese Grand Prix from September 26-28, Marc Marquez coming to round 16 this weekend with a 182-point series lead.
Marquez will win his seventh premier-class title – and first since 2019 – should he leave Motegi in a fortnight with a 185-point advantage, but said on Thursday that he’s not planning to change his approach at a track where he’s won five times, including for Gresini Ducati last year.
“The mindset is to still keep the same mentality, even with seven races to go I want to keep the same mentality because there’s still a lot of races to finish the season,” he said.
“It’s true that maybe we can close the championship earlier, maybe. But we will try to keep the same mentality, because when we finish 2025, we start ’26 already straight away, the next day.”
Marquez was gifted the Barcelona sprint win when his sibling crashed out of the lead with four laps left, but couldn’t prevent Alex from winning his second career Grand Prix the next day, which denied him a championship match point this weekend.
Alex Marquez halted Marc Marquez’s 15-race winning run in the Catalan Grand Prix last weekend. (Photo by Josep LAGO / AFP)Source: AFP
“In the end it was a difficult circuit for me, but we were the rider who scored more points on the weekend,” he said of Barcelona.
“It’s true there was one rider faster than us, that was Alex in the sprint and main race, but during the weekend I was close to him and this makes me happy. Misano, normally, suits better to my riding style than Catalunya.”
While Bagnaia’s season-long struggles came into sharper focus in front of his local media pack on Thursday, Marquez feels his teammate’s problems aren’t likely to last.
“It’s the first time in his career that he’s in that situation, but he has enough talent to go up from that hole,” he said.
“In the end, I want to beat my teammate and I want to beat my brother, I want to beat everybody. But I don’t want to see that somebody is suffering like ‘Pecco’ [Bagnaia] right now.
“It’s something that is not easy for riders when they are in a difficult moment. It’s difficult to forget, because every day you are talking to journalists, every day [the media] are doing your job and asking the same question and this is something hard for us, but we need to accept.”