Marc Marquez’s judgement on Moto3 superstar David Alonso’s potential

Gresini MotoGP rider Marc Marquez says current runaway Moto3 championship leader David Alonso is “a sponge” following a recent training day with the Colombian.

At the end of last month, Marquez took part in a track day on sports bikes at the Aspar circuit in Spain alongside Alex Marquez, Ivan Ortola, Jaume Masia, Red Bull Rookies Cup rider Maximo Quiles and Alonso.

It followed a brief exchange between Marc Marquez and Alonso at the Red Bull Ring earlier in August.

Asked about Alonso, Marquez praised the 18-year-old’s ability to take onboard feedback and demonstrate visible steps forward as a result.

“He’s a sponge,” Marquez said of Alonso.

“He’s a rider that I was training with him and Maximo Quiles. Both of them, they are super young and talented.

“And especially you say something to them at the beginning of the day, and in the end of the day they are doing better than you.

“So, this is something really nice.

“And especially from both of them, but especially David, they give everything on training and this is something even in my career I crashed a lot and I trained a lot and I won a lot, but still I need that young spirit in those trainings in 35 degrees to keep going at the limit.

“And they give to me that spirit and it was a pleasure for me.”

Alonso, who is in his second year of grand prix racing, currently sits top of the Moto3 standings and is 70 points clear of Dani Holgado after 13 rounds of the 2024 campaign.

Recently, the Aspar squad announced it would be promoting Alonso to its Moto2 squad for the 2025 season replacing Marc VDS-bound Jake Dixon.

On Wednesday, the team also confirmed that Holgado would join Alonso in Moto2. The pair were previously team-mates at Aspar in the Junior Moto3 World Championship, in which Holgado was champion in 2021.