Marc Marquez\u2019s dominance of MotoGP can be distilled down to two aspects of his racing approach, Casey Stoner thinks.<\/p>\n
Stoner never raced against Marquez<\/a>, of course, in fact the Australian was replaced by the Spaniard at the Repsol Honda team after his early retirement at the age of 27 in 2012.<\/p>\n Looking from the outside for the entirety of Marquez\u2019s MotoGP<\/a> career, Stoner believes his dominance of the premier class has been down to race craft and understanding how to build a race.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s no doubting his [Marquez] talent, his speed, anything like that, there\u2019s no questioning it,\u201d Casey Stoner<\/a> said, speaking to Crash.net in an interview organised to highlight his role in the new\u00a0Ride 6 videogame, in which he is a kind of \u2018boss character\u2019.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf you did, then there\u2019s something wrong with you.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cBut […] I think so many riders fell into the same trap. Yes, there\u2019s a lot of fast riders out there at the moment, but I don\u2019t think there\u2019s a lot of them that use their full capacity of their race craft. That\u2019s where Marc beats them now.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cMarc did have a big weakness in the past that I don\u2019t think anybody\u2019s noticed and I still won\u2019t say anything about it. But it was surprising that nobody was able to exploit it, I suppose, because everyone [looked at him] like \u2018final boss\u2019 and instead of figuring out what they need to do, what they need to improve in themselves, maybe how to race against Marc, they just kind of saw him as this incredibly difficult competitor.\u201d<\/p>\n Marquez went six years between titles, longer than any other rider in MotoGP history, winning in 2019 and then not again until 2025 as injuries kept him away from the track and an underperforming Honda pushed him to move to Gresini Racing<\/a> before finally landing at the factory Ducati team last year.<\/p>\n Stoner thinks the time between titles has been a benefit to Marquez\u2019s mentality, that he\u2019s stronger and more intelligent now than he was in the 2010s, by the end of which he was 26 and just entering his theoretical physical peak. This intelligence then allows Marquez to win in more strategic ways, rather than simply through pure speed and a willingness to take risks that were more commonly associated with his style in the 2010s.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, my MotoGP career was as long as [the time between Marquez\u2019s last two championships],\u201d Stoner said.<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s been there quite a few years now.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBut what it\u2019s done, over these last years that have been difficult for him, is just build another level of strength and intelligence and patience. It\u2019s seemingly what I think everyone that\u2019s racing him now lacks.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cNobody seems to understand what he\u2019s doing in the races to preserve tyres and do all this sort of thing. They just see this one-speed Marc, where he plays a different card each week.<\/p>\n \u201cBut a very common theme I saw throughout [2025], that nobody picked up on enough, was how patient he was with the tyres.\u201d<\/p>\n This tyre treatment aspect of Marquez\u2019s current style of racing is comparable to F1<\/a>, in Stoner\u2019s opinion, and in particular to Max Verstappen<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a little bit like Formula 1,\u201d Stoner said. \u201cThe really good guys at the moment, in particular Max [Verstappen] \u2013 when they\u2019ve put the new tyres on after a pit stop, he takes several laps before he starts to put pace into them, and that gives him an extra 10 or 15 laps towards the end of the stint, [and] with a lot more pace after looking after the tyres and bringing them in slowly, softly.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think Marc has realised what\u2019s necessary out of these [MotoGP] tyres and he really is patient with them.\u201d<\/p>\n Part of Marquez\u2019s ability is riding the bike without too much interference from the electronics, which Stoner thinks allows the electronics to work more effectively later in the race because Marquez\u2019s style preserves grip.<\/p>\n \u201cOne thing that I think he\u2019s very good at as well is\u2013 everybody else is just relying on the electronics, and the electronics are only reacting to a reaction,\u201d Stoner explained.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, the bike underneath starts to slip or slide, then the electronics will take over more. So, Marc is basically keeping the electronics back from that and basically conserving the tyre as much as possible so that, when the electronics do take over, they\u2019re not having to deal with this incredibly fast slip that\u2019s coming up \u2013 it\u2019s a lot slower and more predictable.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cAnd he can make those tyres last a lot longer to the point that when the electronics take over, when the grip level goes down, his grip level is much higher because he was so gentle on them at the start. I saw that race after race.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf you go back, you can just see his patience so often with the tyres, unless it was a certain race or track that he felt he had pace to go out and take charge, and in that case he sort of would flip the switch and make everybody think that they don\u2019t know what he\u2019s doing.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBut I think he just listens to the bike and the tyres well enough now to understand what part of the race is won, and if you watch all of the recent [races], especially the second part of the year, it was always at the end of the race that he was incredibly strong because he was so gentle on the tyres in the early stages.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI think people just didn\u2019t pick up on that enough.\u201d<\/p>\n A lack of reliance on electronics is one of the standout characteristics of Stoner\u2019s own style, one which was born on oil-slicked Australian dirt tracks.<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n It means that it\u2019s something Stoner is well-positioned to notice in the approach of other riders, and means he knows the advantages of such a style.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s something that I prided myself on, that I didn\u2019t need the electronics,\u201d Stoner said.<\/p>\n \u201cI found that level of grip and would ride in front of them [electronics] because a rider, if they\u2019re able to understand where the grip level is \u2013 a little bit in front of the electronics \u2013 is always going to be faster because they can react, or they\u2019re ready to react, a lot quicker than what the electronics are.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe electronics are always in delay because they\u2019re not expecting it until it\u2019s gone, the grip.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, I think that\u2019s how Marc sort of plays things a little bit more, is he just does not put the same amount of pressure, he picks up the bike far more than everybody else. He\u2019s much more patient, especially at the start of the race, he\u2019s taking a lot less out of the tyre, he runs a little less corner speed, picks up the bike, drives it out with a little more certainty, doesn\u2019t have it sliding and spinning and moving and really stressing the tyre.<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n \u201cAnd because he\u2019s able to stay on just on that line, a little bit ahead of the electronics, then basically later on, when the tyre grip is going down, the electronics will kick in a little bit more; he\u2019s already got a percentage of tyre, if you like, that is better than the rest and that just allows him to find something that the others cannot.\u201d<\/p>\n Subscribe to our MotoGP Newsletter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Marc Marquez\u2019s dominance of MotoGP can be distilled down to two aspects of his racing approach, Casey Stoner…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":482388,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,21588,8456,4280,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-482387","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-casey-stoner","11":"tag-ducati-lenovo-team","12":"tag-marc-marquez","13":"tag-motor","14":"tag-motor-sports","15":"tag-motosport","16":"tag-motosports","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=482387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482387\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/482388"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}