Ducati’s Pecco Bagnaia has taken the blame for failing to get into Q2 on Friday at the 2026 MotoGP Thai Grand Prix, while noting “we never managed to get the timing right”.
The double world champion came into this weekend’s opening round of the 2026 season in a more confident mood, having seemingly rediscovered his form in testing.
But Pecco Bagnaia delivered the first major shock of the new campaign on Friday, when he failed to secure a direct Q2 place for Saturday’s qualifying and was only 15th on the timesheets.
Bagnaia is the only GP26 rider not through to Q2 at this stage, but has taken the blame for this in what was “definitely a complicated day” due to the afternoon being impacted by rain.
“I didn’t work well in that moment; it was definitely a complicated day in the afternoon,” Bagnaia told Sky Italy.
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“I wasn’t able to be competitive.
“We had some testing to do, but with the conditions we had, maybe it would have been better to stay put.
“I think we never managed to get the timing right.
“But it’s the first day, we have tomorrow to get back to Q2 and give it 100%.”
He later told the official MotoGP website: “I just worked bad. I didn’t get into the conditions, which were a bit different, and I struggled quite a bit to adapt.”
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Bezzecchi has big gap to the rest, claims Bagnaia
Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi dominated Friday at Buriram, so far delivering on the promise the Italian brand showed in pre-season testing.
Bagnaia believes Bezzecchi has a clear advantage over the rest going into the rest of the weekend, even if VR46’s Fabio Di Giannantonio was on a similar level in terms of long-running pace.
Bagnaia added: “This morning was pretty good, although we still see a super-fast Aprilia with Bezzecchi, and right now I think he has a nice gap over everyone else.
“This afternoon, trying a slightly different setup with small differences, had a significant impact, and I wasn’t able to be competitive.
“Seeing the rain and wind coming, we tried to set a time almost immediately, but I wasn’t in the best shape set-up-wise.
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“It was my fault for not being able to take full advantage of the situation.”
Aprilia has managed to get three bikes directly into Q2 on Saturday morning, while Ducati has Marc Marquez, Alex Marquez and Di Giannantonio.
Honda and KTM have gotten two bikes into the first pole shootout of the year so far.
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