Impeding on Marquez, Bezzecchi punished in Austin
Marco Bezzecchi‘s weekend gets complicated. The Italian was sanctioned by the MotoGP stewards with two positions on the starting grid of the Austin GP for impeding Marc Marquez at turn-12 during Q2. Same punishment for Luca Marini: the sanctions apply only to Sunday’s race.
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The two former teammates were punished because they “were riding slowly and on the racing line“. Bezzecchi himself admitted to “not having seen” Marquez approaching and to having slowed down because Marini had “practically stopped” in front of him.
Marco Bezzecchi and Luca Marini have been handed a 2-place grid penalty by the FIM #MotoGP Stewards for Sunday’s GP due to riding slow online in Q2 ⚠️#USGP 🇺🇸
— MotoGP™🏁 (@MotoGP) March 28, 2026
The video
This is the video of the incident.
👀 @marcmarquez93 waved his arm to Marco Bezzecchi #USGP 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/hVYNb1z24H
— MotoGP™🏁 (@MotoGP) March 28, 2026
With this penalty, Bezzecchi drops from second to fourth position on the grid: on the front row, behind Fabio Di Giannantonio and Pedro Acosta, there will therefore be Francesco Bagnaia. Marini will instead start 11th. Marquez himself was cleared for a similar incident with Enea Bastianini: the world champion was exonerated because his positioning was not on the racing line.
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