TARDOZZI CALLS BAGNAIA’S MISANO QUALIFYING A SHAME AS PECCO SAYS THE PROBLEM IS HUGE

Ducati team manager Davide Tardozzi has described Francesco Bagnaia’s miserable Misano weekend as a “shame”, insisting the Borgo Panigale squad is still working to pull the two-time San Marino GP winner out of his slump—despite another weekend that has not delivered the expected pace.

Bagnaia’s problems at the 2026 San Marino Grand Prix were laid bare in qualifying. The 29-year-old could only manage P14 for the race after setting the fourth-fastest time in Q1, and he then finished the Sprint Race in P13. Tardozzi pointed to the fact that Misano has historically been one of Bagnaia’s strongest tracks, underlining how unusual this result is for a rider who has previously dominated there. The Ducati team boss said the underlying issue is not a lack of effort, but the inability to find the right direction for Bagnaia’s current difficulties. Speaking to TNT Sports 2, Tardozzi said: “As I said several times, we still work to try to find something that gives him back the feeling. But so far, we are not able to do it.” He added that missing the front row at Misano is especially painful because Bagnaia has typically been among the fastest riders there: “And yeah, [Bagnaia not] being in [the] first row in Misano, it’s a shame because the fact he’s always been one of the fastest riders on this race track.”

Tardozzi noted that Bagnaia had previously held the lap record at the circuit, and that even with the current struggles he had been able to reduce the gap to the benchmark pace set by Aprilia’s Marco Bezzecchi. “He used to have the lap record till few tenths of the lap time of Bezzecchi today,” Tardozzi said, before concluding: “But anyway, we are always fighting and struggling to find the right solution.”

Bagnaia’s qualifying setback also stood out against other riders on Ducati machinery. Alex Marquez, riding for Gresini, qualified P9 on his GP26, while Marc Marquez and VR46’s Fabio Di Giannantonio both made it through to the front end of the grid with P2 and P4 respectively for the San Marino GP. Meanwhile, Bezzecchi took pole with a new Misano lap record of 1:29.982, eclipsing Bagnaia’s previous best of 1:30.031 from 2024.

The weekend’s story began in practice, where Bagnaia struggled on Friday. Although he appeared to improve by Saturday morning, setting the eighth-fastest lap in the final practice session before qualifying, it was not enough to secure a place in Q2. Bagnaia failed to advance from Q1, with Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse) and Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini) progressing instead. Even the wider field highlighted the gap: Fabio Quartararo, on the Yamaha YZR-M1, outpaced Bagnaia in qualifying, taking P3 in Q1 by 0.117s.

On Saturday, Bagnaia’s frustration spilled into his post-Sprint comments. After finishing 13th, he said he felt “frustrated and humiliated”, adding: “Honestly, it's very difficult to speak about feeling because I don't have any.” He explained that although he had felt “a bit better” earlier, the moment the team tried a new soft rear for qualifying the grip felt the same as a used soft. He also claimed the gap to other Ducatis was easy to see: “Like I said yesterday, it's extremely easy to see the difference between what my bike is doing compared to all the other Ducatis.”

Bagnaia said the team had “without any answers” and that he was simply trying to do the maximum. Asked about the situation, he said: “Enter [the track] and push, and do the maximum… But honestly, the result didn't come, the same. So I don't know.” He stressed that he could not feel meaningful differences between tyres or compounds: “I didn't feel any difference between the soft and the medium front this morning, yesterday… I don't feel any difference between new or used soft… It means that the problem is huge, and it's difficult to understand this thing.”

He also described how setup changes were no longer producing the expected behaviour. “Right now, we don't have any plan, just to try to figure things out,” he said, adding that in the past the team would “charge more the rear to have more support” when he had low grip, but now “if we put more charge [load] on the rear, I lose grip.” He further said braking characteristics had flipped: “Normally you need to brake with both tyres, but now if I brake with both tyres, it's worse than braking with just the front.” Bagnaia summed up the sensation by comparing it to riding without engine braking: “So it's like the opposite… the feeling is like entering a corner with the clutch [pulled in] in your hand. So completely without engine brake. And the bike cannot work like this.”

Speedweek’s report echoed the same theme and added more detail from Bagnaia’s explanation: he said that after fitting a new soft tyre in qualifying, it delivered the same performance as a used one, and that he cannot “speak about feeling” because he has none. He also said the frustration is that there are “no answers” to why his bike is a “special case,” stressing that the Ducati behaves completely differently from the Bologna bikes of his colleagues.

Valentino Rossi suggested the root of the issue may lie in how Ducati has been managing Bagnaia’s bike setup, saying the electronics and engine braking were not right during Friday practice. With Bagnaia now heading into Sunday’s San Marino GP near the back of the pack, his focus is on simply seeing the chequered flag at Misano after a weekend that has not matched his usual standards at the circuit.

New comments from Neil Hodgson added another layer to the debate around Ducati’s support. Hodgson said Bagnaia is having an “absolute nightmare” and described what he sees in the garage: “He looks lost. He looks confused in the garage. He’s shaking his head a lot. [He] does not look comfortable on that bike at all.” Hodgson also rejected suggestions that Ducati have already given up on Bagnaia, insisting: “That’s absolutely not the case at all,” and arguing that the team are trying to restore his confidence and feel, adding that Ducati will “spend more time with Pecco than Marc.”

Hodgson’s defence came amid renewed attention on Bagnaia’s future: Ducati has decided not to offer him a new deal, and he is set to join Aprilia on a four-year contract from 2027. Bagnaia’s Misano weekend, however, has turned into a difficult send-off in the present, with his qualifying exit leaving him “humiliated” and his anger visible after Q1 when he punched his bike.