ALEX MARQUEZ SAYS AUSTRIA WEEKEND IS “HARD TO ENJOY” AFTER SPRINT STRUGGLES

After a strong second place in Misano, Alex Marquez found little to celebrate during the Sprint at Spielberg. Starting from fifth on Saturday, the Ducati rider delivered a solid ride, but he lacked the outright pace to match the Aprilia contingent of Jorge Martin and Marco Bezzecchi, as well as Ai Ogura, and KTM’s Pedro Acosta. The gap became especially clear when Martin surged from eighth to the front.

Speaking to the media after the race, Marquez summed up the weekend with a blunt assessment: “The word ‘suffering’ describes our weekend.” He added that it was difficult to make sense of what was happening on the bike, describing the feeling as similar to the start of the season in Thailand, when he had also been working with the same tyre situation. “We have to work step by step,” he said, explaining that the progress made so far had not been enough to keep up with Aprilia and with Pedro’s KTM.

Marquez also pointed to a major disruption earlier in the day. In Friday qualifying, he crashed heavily at the exit of Turn 1, and he said he could not really explain why it happened there. That raised the question of whether he lacked confidence in the machine. “Yes, because the bike sometimes reacts a bit unpredictably,” he replied. For the Sprint, he said Ducati had made numerous changes, including swapping the aerodynamics package—something he noted is not normally done before a Sprint. “We used the Sprint to make changes to the setup and the aerodynamics,” Marquez said. “It worked better, but it wasn’t good enough. We still have the problem with a lack of grip.”

When asked why Aprilia appeared so strong at the Red Bull Ring, Marquez offered a technical explanation. In his view, it comes down to the tyre carcass and how Aprilia converts that into performance. “It’s about the tyre carcass and how they (Aprilia) transfer the performance onto the tyres—it works better for them than for us,” he said. He contrasted his own bike’s behaviour with Aprilia’s, saying his Ducati works better in stop-and-go conditions, but that requires more rear grip. He also claimed Aprilia could carry more speed through the corner apex and that they were smoother when opening the throttle. “They are softer on the gas,” he said, adding that while the bikes are different, Ducati is trying to solve the issue. “It would be good to find a solution, because we’ll have this tyre carcass also in Indonesia.”

Finally, Marquez described how the Sprint felt from a rider’s perspective. “Zero,” he joked when asked about how much fun he had. “I feel very bad on the bike.” He said that during qualifying he had even asked himself whether he remembered how to ride, concluding: “It’s difficult to enjoy it. On the bike you can only enjoy it when you’re fast. If someone is faster than you, then you suffer.”