Bezzecchi started from pole and moved right at the lights to cover the inside line, denying Márquez the move that had won him Saturday’s sprint. It worked — the Italian held the lead through Turn 1. But he pushed too hard trying to keep the reigning world champion behind him on the opening lap and slid out of the race at Turn 12, ending his weekend before it had properly begun.

That handed Márquez the lead, with Martín’s Aprilia second after clearing the Ducatis of Fabio Di Giannantonio and Fermín Aldeguer off the line. Martín then produced the move of the race, launching a surprise attack into Turn 4 and outbraking Márquez to take the lead with just three tenths separating them.

Márquez dropped eight tenths adrift and briefly fell into the clutches of his brother, before rebuilding his pace. On lap 12 he sent the Ducati up the inside into Turn 6 and passed the Aprilia with ease. From there Martín’s race unravelled — he lost places to Álex Márquez and Acosta over the next four laps as his pace fell away sharply.

Álex was running a special livery in tribute to the late Marco Simoncelli, and his recovery from a disastrous Saturday to second place was one of the stories of the weekend. Acosta, meanwhile, continued his remarkable run on the factory KTM, climbing from seventh on the grid to the final podium spot.

Raúl Fernández took sixth for Trackhouse after starting tenth, while Di Giannantonio recovered from a slow start to finish seventh for VR46. Behind them, Bastianini was eighth for Tech3, with Marini and Quartararo completing the top ten for Honda and Yamaha respectively. Beyond Bezzecchi, the most high-profile retirement was Francesco Bagnaia, whose difficult season continued with another non-score for the factory Ducati squad.

Misano sits barely an hour from Aprilia’s Noale factory, and the weekend could hardly have gone worse. Bezzecchi converted pole into a lap-one retirement. Martín, who had led the race and looked capable of winning it, finished fifth — fourteen seconds behind Márquez — after his pace collapsed in the middle stages.

The cause has since been explained: Martín revealed arm pump was behind the sudden fall-off, and is reportedly considering surgery. It is the kind of problem that can be fixed, but the timing is brutal with the championship level at the top.

Bezzecchi’s own assessment afterwards was that the crash “hurts a lot” but was not down to championship pressure — he simply pushed beyond the limit trying to hold off a rider with Márquez’s race craft on the opening lap. Whether that reading holds up over the remaining rounds is one of the questions defining the run-in.

The San Marino result produced the tightest championship picture of the season. Marc Márquez and Jorge Martín are level on 274 points, with Márquez ahead on countback because he has won more races. Bezzecchi’s retirement from pole cost him the outright lead he had carried into the weekend.

Ducati has publicly played down the significance, with the team insisting there are no favourites in a fight this close. That is a defensible position: Márquez leads on a technicality, Martín has the pace when the Aprilia works, and Bezzecchi remains within range if he stops throwing away weekends like this one.

Alongside the racing, 2026 has been dominated by the most comprehensive rider reshuffle in years. The signing of MotoGP’s new commercial agreement covering 2027 to 2031, announced at the Brno Grand Prix, triggered a wave of official line-up announcements — and with the sport moving to 850cc machinery in 2027, manufacturers have been locking in riders for a completely new technical era.

The latest domino fell with the Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team confirming WorldSBK star Nicolò Bulega, who joins Fermín Aldeguer in an all-Italian-flavoured line-up. Here is the near-complete 2027 grid as it stands.

The four moves that define the reshuffle

• Pedro Acosta to Ducati. KTM’s brightest asset moves to the factory Ducati seat, replacing Bagnaia. On today’s evidence — third from seventh on the grid, on a KTM — Ducati have bought well.
• Francesco Bagnaia to Aprilia. A four-year deal announced during the Dutch GP weekend, a day after Acosta’s Ducati move, giving Aprilia an all-Italian factory pairing with Bezzecchi.
• Jorge Martín to Yamaha. The man level on points at the top of the 2026 standings leaves Aprilia for a factory Yamaha project rebuilding around him and Ai Ogura.
• Fabio Quartararo to Honda. Announced during the summer break, HRC poaching the Frenchman from Yamaha after six seasons to lead its 850cc project.

Álex Rins, meanwhile, is departing the MotoGP grid entirely, with the Spaniard heading to WorldSBK for 2027 after Yamaha confirmed he and Quartararo would not continue. Jack Miller also loses his Pramac seat to Moto2 title contender Izan Guevara, announced just before Aragón.

With the grid all but settled, the outstanding questions are narrow but genuinely consequential for the riders involved.