Race report
MotoGP Dutch GP
MotoGP Dutch GP: Bezzecchi wins sprint race, Quartararo on podium
Marco Bezzecchi beat championship leader and fellow Ducati rider Francesco Bagnaia into second place at the Dutch GP, with Fabio Quartararo taking a surprise podium for Yamaha.
Richard Asher
Edited: Jun 24, 2023, 2:33 PM
Copy link
Share on Viber
Though Bezzecchi briefly lost the lead from pole position, the man who had dominated the entire weekend was soon back past Bagnaia. And the reigning world champion, who had started second, had no answer.
The result consolidates Bezzecchi's hold on third in the standings, with Bagnaia still leading Pramac Ducati’s Jorge Martin. Bagnaia's advantage has been stretched to 21 points following the sprint race, with Martin only able to finish sixth.
All the frontrunners opted for a combination of hard front tyre and soft rear. And when the lights turned green, Bezzecchi lost out not only to Bagnaia at the first corner, but also to the opportunistic, fast-starting Brad Binder.
But it was only a lap later that the Italian was past the KTM rider, and Bezzecchi was then free to go after his countryman and Ducati rival Bagnaia. He promptly set the fastest lap of the race on lap three.
The battle had barely got going before it was over. Bagnaia ran wide on the fourth lap and almost lost the lead into Turn 5. He held on, but Bezzecchi simply blast past him on the exit.
Though the lead remained a narrow one for the rest of the race, and hovered mostly just beneath the one-second mark, Bezzecchi was able to control it from there to the flag.
Bagnaia was eventually able to shake off the likes of Binder, Quartararo and Aprilia’s Aleix Espargaro, though his margin to the chasers was hardly comfortable either.
The scrap between Binder, Quartaro and Espargaro never really ignited in the last lap, and the trio crossed the line in that order.
Binder would soon be disappointed, however. He was issued a three-second penalty for exceeding track limits, promoting Quartararo to a podium position that gave some much-needed joy to the Yamaha camp.
It also meant fourth place for Espargaro, with Binder classified fifth following the penalty.
Martin spent some time battling with Binder, Quartararo and Espargaro, but dropped back almost three seconds behind them by the flag, with Aprilia’s Maverick Vinales less than a second further back in seventh.
Luca Marini had a bad start from third on the grid behind Bezzecchi and Bagnaia, dropping to fifth at the first corner. He then fell further down the field to an eventual 10th position after being handed a 0.5s penalty for taking a shortcut.
Johann Zarco ran as high as seventh early on, but struggled for speed with his medium front tyre and trailed home 13th. Miguel Oliveira (Aprilia) was right with the Ducati rider early on but got shoved aside in a lap-one scrap. He eventually came in 19th.
Honda’s Marc Marquez finished the race in his starting position of 17th, after electing to start on soft tyres both front and rear.
MotoGP Dutch GP - Sprint race results:
Cla # Rider Bike Gap 1 72 Marco Bezzecchi
Ducati 2 1 Francesco Bagnaia
Ducati 1.294 3 20 Fabio Quartararo
Yamaha 1.872 4 41 Aleix Espargaro
Aprilia 2.245 5 33 Brad Binder
KTM 4.582 6 89 Jorge Martin
Ducati 5.036 7 12 Maverick Viñales
Aprilia 5.876 8 23 Enea Bastianini
Ducati 10.102 9 73 Alex Marquez
Ducati 10.525 10 10 Luca Marini
Ducati 10.556 11 43 Jack Miller
KTM 11.191 12 30 Takaaki Nakagami
Honda 11.473 13 5 Johann Zarco
Ducati 15.439 14 37 Augusto Fernandez
KTM 17.754 15 21 Franco Morbidelli
Yamaha 19.508 16 32 Lorenzo Savadori
Aprilia 19.664 17 93 Marc Marquez
Honda 19.916 18 25 Raúl Fernández
Aprilia 20.583 19 88 Miguel Oliveira
Aprilia 24.269 20 27 Iker Lecuona
Honda 24.727 21 94 Jonas Folger
KTM 32.056 22 6 Stefan Bradl
Honda 35.372 49 Fabio Di Giannantonio
Ducati View full results
We want your opinion!
What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?
Take our 5 minute survey.
- The Motorsport.com Team
Read and post comments
Read also :
Share Or Save This Story
Copy link
Share on Viber
Previous article MotoGP Dutch GP: Bezzecchi leads all-Ducati front row in qualifying
Next article MotoGP riders agree MotoGP track limits “easy” to overstep at Assen
Top Comments
There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?
View More & Comment
More from
Richard Asher
Marc Marquez unveils simple plan as he closes in on MotoGP title: "Train, eat, sleep, repeat"
MotoGP
MotoGP
Qatar GP
4 d
Marc Marquez unveils simple plan as he closes in on MotoGP title: "Train, eat, sleep, repeat"
Latest news
Why aerodynamics will become "even more important" under 2027 MotoGP regulations
MotoGP
MGP MotoGP
Qatar GP
23 min
Why aerodynamics will become "even more important" under 2027 MotoGP regulations
Sebastien Bourdais hopes latest WEC success will remind teams of his value
WEC
WEC WEC
Monza
2 h
Sebastien Bourdais hopes latest WEC success will remind teams of his value
"It's horribly painful" - Williams drops 2026 car upgrades to benefit 2027
Formula 1
F1 Formula 1
Sao Paulo GP
3 h
"It's horribly painful" - Williams drops 2026 car upgrades to benefit 2027
Feature
Discover prime content
Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
You have 2 options:
- Become a subscriber.
- Disable your adblocker.
Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here
Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page
Manage Alerts
Subscribe