Japan has always been a special place for Marc Marquez, who has maintained particularly strong ties with the Asian country, where he has celebrated four of the seven world titles he has accumulated in the premier class.
Winning the last of them, in 2025, was probably the most intense and satisfying of them all for a rider who had spent his entire life getting used to winning, only to stop doing so in traumatic fashion in July 2020, following a miscalculation in the rehabilitation of his right shoulder after a crash at Jerez. Six years and as many operations followed, an ordeal that led him to consider throwing in the towel, and even to changing bikes.
All that suffering and tension was perfectly encapsulated in the extraordinary scream he let out a few seconds after crossing the finish line in second place and sealing the championship. “I’ve done it! I really have done it!” he told himself, speaking in Catalan, his mother tongue, as he stood on the footpegs of his Ducati. His cry reached the entire audience thanks to a radio system fitted by the organisers specifically for that purpose.
As the hours went by and he began to calm down, the Spaniard started to feel the symptoms of the accumulated physical and emotional strain. “I’ve found peace with myself, but I’m also empty. Right now, I don’t even feel like getting back on the bike,” he said in the days that followed, without realising that he would indeed spend another considerable stretch of time unable to do what he loves most, as a consequence of the crash he suffered in Indonesia, the race immediately after his title celebrations, in which he injured his shoulder again.
That crash, in which Marco Bezzecchi took him out shortly after the start of Sunday’s race, inevitably sent him back to that cruel starting point and forced him to reinvent himself once more. The rider who will take to the track this Friday for the opening free practice session is very different from the one who did so exactly a year ago, the result of yet another reconstruction in which he has once again adjusted his priorities.
Marquez’s new contract with Ducati represents a considerable improvement in his favour. That is only logical when you consider that, when he signed his previous agreement in June 2024, it was he who prioritised securing a place in the factory team of the Borgo Panigale manufacturer. By 2025, however, he had become the cornerstone of the Bologna-based company, giving him considerable negotiating power, which he duly used. “That said,” sources within Ducati tell Autosport, “the renewal was by no means outrageous, nor was it anywhere near the figures that were being discussed in MotoGP a few years ago.”
Marc Marquez after winning his 2025 MotoGP title
Photo by: Ducati Corse
Several months passed between the signing of the contract and its announcement, as a result of the deadlock in negotiations between the championship promoter and the manufacturers and teams over the commercial side of their relationship. The rider from Cervera, agreed to a two-year deal running until the end of 2028. In this new phase, his earnings will increase considerably compared with the previous two-year period (2025-2026), but so too will the number of commitments he is expected to attend. From next January onwards, having Marquez on board will cost Ducati more, while the #93 is more protective than ever of his priorities.
A good example of the latter came at the event organised by the promoter in central London on the Thursday before the British Grand Prix. The organisers did not send out the list of attendees until the last minute, apparently hoping that Marquez would relent and rearrange his schedule and treatment to attend. That did not happen.
“Why didn’t I go to London? Because I have to look after my recovery, and spending one more day at home can make a big difference,” the Ducati rider explained, presumably anticipating one of the most difficult weekends of the year, in which he eventually finished seventh. “I had no control over my right arm,” he told his technicians immediately after crossing the line at Silverstone. Two consecutive doubles followed, at Aragon and Misano, temporarily putting him back at the top of the standings, until Jorge Martin reclaimed the lead 10 days ago in Austria.
The championship caravan is now in Asia, where this new version of Marquez will seek to maximise his potential once again by making the most of the time available to prepare and recover after each effort. With the fate of the Qatar Grand Prix still to be decided, the #93, like the rest of his rivals, is entering the busiest stretch of the season, with seven races spread across nine weeks. To avoid the effects of the changes in time zones, Marquez will remain in Indonesia with his partner after the Mandalika round, giving himself a little more than a week before travelling on to Australia. “It’s the first time he’s done it, although he had also planned to do it last year, but the crash in Indonesia forced him to change his plans,” one of the members of Vertical, his management agency, who was with him in Tokyo on Wednesday, told Autosport.
On Tuesday, Marquez attended an engagement with Shoei, his helmet manufacturer, which is also one of his longest-standing sponsors. The following morning, he went down to the hotel gym and completed a resistance-band routine designed to mobilise his battered right arm. “He pays very close attention to the readings from the band he wears on his arm, which measures his workload and recovery,” the same source adds. This approach, based on managing the resources of his own body, has also become increasingly evident over the past few grands prix weekends. “I go out on Friday and I already get an idea of how things are going to go. That allows me to regulate myself so I can optimise my energy and the level of risk I take every time I go out on track,” Marquez said.
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Marc Marquez, Ducati Team
Photo by: Mirco Lazzari GP – Getty Images
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