Marc Marquez, 2025 MotoGP Thai Grand Prix. Credit: Gold and Goose
Marc Marquez, 2025 MotoGP Thai Grand Prix. Credit: Gold and Goose
© Gold and Goose

2025 Thai MotoGP, Buriram: Friday Practice as it happened

Recap Friday practice for the season-opening 2025 Thai MotoGP round at Buriram.

The 2025 MotoGP season beg𒉰ins with a pair of Friday practice sessions at Buriram, the second of which will decide the top ten for diജrect Qualifying 2 access.

Reigning world champion Jorge Martin remains absent after suffering furt♋her hand injuries in training earlier this week 🔯and is replaced by Aprilia test rider Lorenzo Savadori.

Butﷺ Fabio di Giannantonio - also injured on day one of the Sepang test - 🐼is back for VR46.

Marc Marquez was fastest at the recent Buriram pre-season test, where he also delivered a peerless race simulation. The new Ducati Lenovo rider topped theꦗ timesheets ahead of brother Alex Mar🦹quez (Gresini), Marco Bezzecchi (Aprilia) and Pedro Acosta (KTM).

Last year’s title runner-up Francesco Bagnaia was fifth, a♎s the factory Ducati team committed to keeping the GP24 engine, follꦐowed by the top Honda of Joan Mir with Fabio Quartararo in eighth for Yamaha.

FP1꧟ takes place from 10:45 to 11:30am local time with ༺afternoon practice from 3-4pm.

09:03

So, it's Alex Marquez from Marc Marquꦛez at the top of Practice and Acosta thi💖rd.

Bezzecchi t🌱akes fourth, ahea🌠d of Morbidelli, Mir, Fernandez, Quartararo, Ogura, and Zarco.

Vinales, Binder, and most notably Bagnaia all miss out and will h🦄ave to contend with Q1 tomorrow morning.

09:02

Marc Marquez has just been bumped to second at the death there by his brother, Alex🦹, who tops Practice with a 1:29.020.

09:01

Bagnaia on another lap now but it's෴ gone away in the third sector th🌞anks to Franco Morbidelli who was - not for the first time - cruising on the line.

08:59

Bagnaia n♑ow back to 11th thanks to an Ogura lap that put thܫe rookie eighth.

08:59

Bagnaia has had his lap deleted f꧃or yellow flags and is back to 10th. Bez꧑zecchi meanwhile has crashed at turn three.

08:58

Bagnaia up to seventh with his first lap, al🍸most 0.3s off the top time of Marquez, though.

08:57

According💮 to the timing screens, Bagnaia is out for his final time attack on a ᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚ3-lap-old soft tyre.

08:56

Be🍷zzecchi up to second place, now, and Bagnaia is now down tꦍo 10th and on the Q2 bubble.

08:55

Second time attacks beginning now.

Quartararo up to third with the first lap on his second tyre, but he's bumped to fourth as Morbidelli goe🍰s second.

08:53

Bagnaia was on a personal best at the third sector on his second flying lap on his firs🃏t tyre but he's pitted. He's nin✤th ahead of the final time attacks. 

Just under seven minutes to go.

08:52

Not a brilliant first lap from Bagnaia - only n꧟inth and 0.5s off the pace.

08:51

Ogura into t✅he top 10 in ninth, and now Bagnaia is delivering his first time attack.

08:50

Marquez extends his advantage at the top with a 29.197, then Alex Marquez goes up to secon🧸d with a 29.400.

08:48

Marque༺z's first time attack takes hiܫm back to the top, a 1:29.374 puts him clear by 0.124s over Acosta.

08:47

Acosta fina🐠lly beats Zarco's ti♏me with a 1:29.509 and goes to the top and Morbidelli goes second.

08:47

Brad Binde rup t꧃o second with his first time attack lap. 1:29.804 for the KTM rider, but faster lap𓆉s coming behind.

Quartararo third, and Acosta is on the way too.

08:43

Marini into the 1:29s with his latest lap. Looks like a time attackꦜ with a fresh soft tyre but he's behind Marquez, who hasn't done a hot lap yet.

08:39

Marquez done with that run now, still only four l✱aps on that tyre. He did run wide at turn four, so perhaps something he wants to change.

08:38

ꦚAnother 29.9 for Marquez. It's a go🎐od tenth or two better than we've seen in terms of race pace from anyone else.

08:36

Marc Marquez now out on a fresh hard compound rear tyre and going rather quickly. Just went away at the end of the lap there for Marquez but it's still a 1:29.9; but in the meantime J🔯ohann Zarco goes fastest on a 1:29.624.

08:32

Just under half-an-h💃our to go in Practice now, and it's still Marquez who leads. Bagnaia and Acosta both lapping in the low-1:30s at the moment, but Acosta is running with the hard rear tyre, Bagnaia the medium.

And as we say that, looks like Bagnaia is done with this ru📖n.

08:29

Bagnaia now doing some race running. Pace seemingly a couple of tenths shy of Marquez's but he's about compa🌳rable with Acosta in low-1:30s.

08:28

Joan Mir doing his best Toprak Razgatlioglu impression with a seemingly intentional stoppie braking for the final corner. Not the smoothest landing for the rear tyre, but this is looking increasingly promising for HRC and Mir, who actually 🦩looks relatviely comfortable on the RC213V for perhaps the first time since he jumped on it at the end of 2022.

08:25

Somkiat Chantra lapping in the low-1:36s at the moment💝 and is the 🥂only Honda rider still running that pilot whale-ish tail unit.