20/10/2025

Winners and losers from MotoGP’s 2025 Australian Grand Prix

The Australian Grand Prix wasn’t as chaotic or unconventional as the previous round in Indonesia, but it did throw a surprise winner as Raul Fernandez claimed his maiden victory in MotoGP.

Fabio di Giannantonio flew the flag for Ducati in second, while Marco Bezzecchi bounced back from a penalty to complete the podium.

KTM endured a tough weekend, with Honda and Yamaha also largely underperforming after showing promise in previous races.

Here are the winners and losers from the 19th round of the 2025 MotoGP season.

Winners: Raul Fernandez and Trackhouse

Raul Fernandez, Trackhouse Racing

Photo by: William West — AFP — Getty Images

The big winner (both literally and metaphorically) at Phillip Island was Trackhouse rider Raul Fernandez.
During his first three MotoGP seasons, the Spaniard struggled to match the promise he’d shown in Moto2, where he finished second to Remy Gardner in 2021. There were also doubts about whether he would retain his seat at Trackhouse heading into 2025. But both Massimo Rivola and Davide Brivio personally kept faith in him, and that decision has been vindicated by his victory in the Australian GP.

Fernandez endured a slow start to the 2025 season after missing the Sepang test, and was comprehensively outperformed by rookie team-mate Ai Ogura. But he has been steadily picking up pace and appeared to make a breakthrough in Indonesia, where Aprilia had by far the fastest bike on the grid. He scored his first MotoGP podium in any form in the sprint, but a sixth-place finish in the grand prix left many disappointed, not least Aprilia boss Rivola.

However, Fernandez set that right in Australia, avoiding any errors and capitalising on Marco Bezzecchi’s penalty to finally stand on the top step of the podium. The result would come as a massive confidence boost for the soon-to-be 25-year-old, who has spoken openly about the hardships he faced earlier in the season.

It’s also a landmark achievement for American squad Trackhouse, which has big ambitions in MotoGP after expanding its operations beyond NASCAR last year. Trackhouse is now the third-best satellite team, only behind Ducati’s Gresini and VR46 squads. With the RS-GP improving significantly, this outfit will be the one to watch in 2026.

Winner: Aprilia

Raul Fernandez, Trackhouse Racing, Marco Bezzecchi, Aprilia Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

While Fernandez and Trackhouse deserve praise, Aprilia merits its own spotlight for the scale of its achievement in Australia. Beating Ducati is one thing, but dominating like Borgo Panigale? That’s another level.

Aprilia has not only resolved the RS-GP’s consistency issues but is also hitting the peaks it enjoyed in 2023 and ’24. Many in the paddock now consider Aprilia the fastest bike on the grid, but it’s hard to testify to the claim until the next round in Spain or until Marc Marquez returns.

Credit goes to Aprilia’s leadership, particularly Rivola and new technical director Fabiano Sterlacchini, who have worked meticulously to close the gap to the front even when everything pointed to Ducati remaining unbeatable until the end of the rules cycle.

Not only is the RS-GP fast, but Aprilia’s management has also overcome lineup challenges, with Jorge Martin sidelined by injury and Ai Ogura still cautious after a two-race layoff. Essentially racing with just two riders in Australia, the team saw both finish on the podium after learning from their mistakes in Indonesia.

One can only imagine how formidable Aprilia will be when it is firing on all four cylinders.

Loser: Ducati

Francesco Bagnaia, Ducati Team

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

If the Indonesia weekend was bad enough, Ducati hit another low point in Australia, even though it was ultimately able to salvage a podium finish. Its streak of having at least one bike on the front row since 2020 was always going to end, but many were surprised that it could do no better than sixth in qualifying. Sprint results were also surprising, but you have to believe Francesco Bagnaia when he said Marquez would have been on the podium had he been racing in Australia.

Arguably, Ducati was the most competitive on Sunday, as di Giannantonio charged through the field to finish second, 1.4s behind race winner Fernandez. Of course, had Bezzecchi not had the double long-lap penalty, no one else would have had even a faint chance of winning the race. But given the circumstances on Sunday, one must wonder if Ducati could have still come away with a win — like it did in Indonesia — if di Giannantonio had qualified higher up the grid.

Either way, the weekend highlighted Ducati’s over-reliance on Marquez, both within the factory team and across its entire contingent. With the nine-time world champion out of action, the factory team came away with zero points, as Bagnaia finished second-to-last in the sprint and then crashed out of the main race. Michele Pirro, Marquez’s stand-in, was never going to have a chance of a points finish in his first grand prix in 11 months.

Winner: Alex Rins

Alex Rins, Yamaha Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

Alex Rins’ impressive podium-contending performance in Mandalika was put down to circumstances, but Phillip Island showed that the six-time race winner had made a genuine improvement on the Yamaha.

Starting 11th, Rins stayed patient for the first 19 laps, keeping his tyres fresh. This allowed him to challenge the KTMs late on in the race, as he overtook Tech3 duo Pol Espargaro and Enea Bastianini, before passing the factory bike of Brad Binder and the Gresini Ducati of Fermin Aldeguer on a single lap to move up to seventh. While the Honda of Luca Marini was too far up at this stage, he managed to stretch out his advantage over the struggling KTMs to secure his best result of the season.

Rins’ rise is not down to a magic solution, but routine work with the engineers — and on his own mental health — to tame a bike he has struggled with since his switch to Yamaha in 2024.

This turnaround couldn’t have come at a better time, as it gives Yamaha another weapon in its armour ahead of its much-anticipated switch to a V4-powered bike in 2026.

Loser: Fabio Quartararo

Fabio Quartararo, Yamaha Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

While Rins has been making rapid gains in recent races, Quartararo has been struggling more than ever on the other side of the Yamaha garage. Of course, the 2021 champion can still drag the M1 to some impossible results, and the pole position he achieved on Saturday is testament to his incredible talent. But a strong qualifying matters for little if the rider in question can’t even finish inside the top 10 the next day (whether due to his own shortcomings or the bike’s).

Quartararo was already struggling more than other Yamaha riders in Indonesia, but his collapse in the race on Sunday was even starker. The Frenchman was left baffled as he essentially became a moving chicane at Phillip Island, struggling to both stop the bike and maintain his speed under cornering.

Considering that Rins made most of his moves late in the race, Quartararo’s drop in performance was even more astounding. While the Spaniard was able to lap in the mid-to-high 1m28s on worn tyres, Quartararo could only manage a speed in the 1m29.3s bracket.

Yamaha and Quartararo have significant work to do in the final races to address these issues, especially with the former not yet convinced about the V4’s potential.

Winner: Fabio di Giannantonio

Fabio Di Giannantonio, VR46 Racing Team

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

Fabio di Giannantonio described his runner-up finish in the Australian GP as “bittersweet”, but there is no shame in finishing second on a weekend when all other Ducatis struggled for pace.

After a few difficult rounds in which he had watched himself getting outperformed by team-mate Franco Morbidelli, di Giannantonio reasserted his status as VR46’s lead rider with a charging ride from 10th on the grid.

The 27-year-old was quick from the get-go in practice and would have been a much more potent threat in the race had he qualified well. Nevertheless, he picked up his rivals one after the other, passing riders like Pedro Acosta and Alex Marquez with relative ease to secure his best result of the year.

It wasn’t quite like Fermin Aldeguer’s performance in Indonesia, but di Giannantonio certainly picked up the baton at Ducati in Marquez’s absence. With the latter confirmed to miss the Malaysian GP (and most certainly the following round in Portugal) and Bagnaia still struggling, he looks well-placed to make an impact in the season’s final rounds.

Losers: Pedro Acosta and KTM

Pedro Acosta, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / LAT Images / via Getty Images

KTM’s tyre degradation issues are nothing new, but in a race that offered so many opportunities, Pedro Acosta and the rest were right to be irked by their dramatic drop in performance late in the race.

In Indonesia, Acosta was still able to hang on to second place, but this time he didn’t have the tools to put up a fight, dropping from second to fifth in the last 12 laps. In fact, he was fortunate not to be pipped by Marini as the two riders crossed the finish line just 0.040s apart. As Acosta explained, he was actually nursing his tyres throughout the race, which makes their dramatic drop-off all the more frustrating.

It was a similar story elsewhere at KTM, with even test rider Pol Espargaro left puzzled after “destroying” his rear tyre in the race.

KTM can take consolation from the fact that all four of its riders finished inside the top 10, a rare feat in a Ducati-dominated championship. But with Aprilia winning the race and bagging the maximum points from the weekend, the Austrian marque can say goodbye to its hope of finishing second in the championship.