MotoGP fans watching the 2025 MotoGP Americas GP this past weekend bore witness to one of the most chaotic race starts in recent years. Just 30 minutes before lights out, light rain began to fall, forcing race officials to declare the race flag-to-flag. However, pandemonium soon followed as riders scrambled to adapt to the unexpected conditions.
The moment chaos began
The chaos kicked off when Fabio Quartararo crashed on his way to the grid during the formation lap of the Americas GP. With all but three riders initially set up for wet conditions, expectations were that the race would be officially declared wet and proceed under flag-to-flag rules.
However, a split-second decision by Ducati’s Marc Marquez sent the entire grid into disarray.
As the warm-up lap approached, only three riders, Brad Binder (KTM), Ai Ogura (Trackhouse Aprilia), and Enea Bastianini (Tech3 KTM), had taken the gamble to start on slick tyres, believing the track was drying. Meanwhile, the rest of the grid remained on wet tyres.
Marquez abruptly abandoned his bike on the grid and sprinted back to the pitlane to switch to his dry-condition bike. Several riders, including Pecco Bagnaia and Alex Marquez, followed suit.
The rush to the pits caused confusion among riders, with Maverick Viñales attempting to wheel his Tech3 KTM back onto the grid through a gap in the pit wall. This left race control with little choice but to throw the red flag, halting the start and calling for a restart.
The Marquez gambit
In the aftermath, Marquez admitted that his move was not a spur-of-the-moment decision but rather a calculated risk based on his understanding of MotoGP’s regulations.
“I really know the rules,” said Marquez, “And how to do, and how to be on the limit all the time. Seven minutes before the start, I asked my chief mechanic if the second bike was ready. He told me ‘yes’. And then I said to him, ‘maybe I will leave the grid.’ Why? Because I predicted that when I left, more than 10 riders would follow me, and then they’d stop the race. And that’s what happened.”
Bagnaia, who also bolted for the pits after seeing Marquez’s move, later admitted he was worried about whether enough riders would follow suit to justify an aborted start.
“As soon as I started running, I just hoped that many more riders would follow,” Bagnaia said. “I said, ‘if we are just two, I think some penalties could arrive.’ But then I saw that many riders were following from the big screen, and I said, ‘OK, they will not have time enough to remove the bikes from the grid.’ So there will not be any penalty.”
Under MotoGP’s regulations, more than 10 riders abandoning their grid slots is required to trigger an aborted start. However, as it turned out, exactly 10 riders left the grid, meaning the conditions for an automatic aborted start were not technically met.
Yet, with movement in the pitlane and Viñales running down the grid without a bike, race direction made the call to delay the start anyway.
This led to frustration among those who had originally opted for slicks. Ogura’s Trackhouse team boss Davide Brivio was “very upset,” arguing that race control had mismanaged the situation, costing his rider a strategic advantage.
Mike Webb, the race director at the Americas GP defended the decision, stating he had previously called for a delay.
“We called for a delay and then quick start procedure due to safety concerns. Given the number of riders, bikes, and pit staff on the grid and in the pitlane area, it was impossible to start the warm-up lap. A new race start was the safest way to respond to the unprecedented circumstances.”
Despite the red flag, all riders were allowed to reclaim their original grid positions, which further fueled the controversy. Penalties or pitlane starts should be levied for those who have abandoned their grid spots, drawing comparisons to the infamous 2018 Argentina GP, where everyone but Jack Miller opted to switch their bikes.
Calls for clarification
Second-place finisher and new championship leader Alex Marquez was among those calling for a revision of the rules.
“For everybody, it was really like chaos and all that. And we need a clear rule for that,” he said. “I didn’t even know that that was possible, honestly speaking! I just followed the guy,s and that’s it. So, we need to be more clear on that position,
“If they delay the start just for the chaos, it’s not the correct way. It was not fair. Everything needs to be more clear in that way.”
Pedro Acosta also admitted to feeling guilty about how the situation unfolded, particularly for the three riders who had correctly chosen slicks.
“It’s true that it’s not a nice thing because maybe we f***ed up the race of Brad, Enea, these guys who put the money on the slicks,” he said. “I told my crew I’d do whatever Marquez did.”
Binder, one of the few riders who made the correct tyre call, was understandably frustrated but ultimately resigned to the outcome.
“Unfortunately I don’t call the shots. So I’d be wasting my time worrying about it, eh?” Binder said. “Obviously I wasn’t too stoked about the decision to call everyone off. Neither was my crew. It is what it is at the end of the day. S**t happens. It was probably a good call, it was safer for everybody at the end of the day.”
In the end, the controversial restart saw all riders lining up once again, this time all on slicks. Marquez’s gamble almost paid off, as he built a sizeable gap ahead in first place in the restarted race, but crashed out before securing victory. Bagnaia went on to win, but debates surrounding the Americas GP race start still lingers.
