Return to the top after a 12-month nightmare
Raise your hand if, before the 2026 pre-season tests, you would have imagined Jorge Martin second in the World Championship standings after three rounds, just four points off the top of the championship and capable of securing two second places in races and a Sprint victory. Yet these are the numbers recorded by Martinator between Thailand, Brazil, and the United States. Of course, being on this super Aprilia helps quite a bit, and who knows if the 2024 world champion regrets trying to force a break last year and then accepting well in advance for 2027 the advances of a Yamaha that for the moment is struggling not to place all its bikes in the bottom four positions.
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The ‘king’ of the Sprints is back
Martin, however, after all the terrible physical problems, accidents, and surgeries that plagued him throughout 2025, now seems reborn. The Madrid native has first and foremost rediscovered his historic strength: speed in Sprint races. In both 2023 and 2024, #89 was the rider capable of scoring the most points of everyone on Saturdays, and it was precisely in 2024 that the results collected in the short races allowed him to become world champion despite winning only three GPs compared to the 11 won by Francesco Bagnaia.
Martin has scored points in the Sprints in all three rounds of this season and has never finished outside the top 10, achieving a fifth, a third, and a first place for a total haul of 24 points overall. The second in this ranking, Marc Marquez, has scored 21. In Saturday races alone, Martin has already secured 18 more points than Marco Bezzecchi and it is precisely this advantage that allows him to stay close in the standings to his teammate, despite the Rimini native having won all the GPs so far.
Bez is warned
Of course, the World Championship is still long, Ducati and Marc Marquez can rise again, and generally at this stage, Bezzecchi seems faster than Martin. But it is also true that the Spaniard’s physical condition can still improve and his consistency is frightening: in nine races run this year between Sprints and GPs, he has never finished worse than fifth. These numbers, too, are reminiscent of 2024. Bezzecchi is warned.
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