Marc Marquez “proud” of 2024 MotoGP “comeback”

After spending the past three seasons on increasingly uncompetitive Honda machinery, Marc Marquez famously moved to the Gresini team for 2024 in order to try to return to the top step of MotoGP.

He achieved this on three occasions this year, but will now conclude his time as a satellite rider and return to the factory fold; this time with the Ducati Lenovo team alongside Francesco Bagnaia, to whom he finished second in the Solidarity Grand Prix of Barcelona which closed the 2024 season.

“From my personal point of view, for me the comeback I did from the last four years to now is already something that I’m proud of,” Marquez said in the post-race press conference at the Solidarity Grand Prix.

“So, let’s see what we can do in the next two years in the official team.

“We know that we will have a very strong teammate, we will have the main reference inside the garage, because he has won 11 races this year, he was super-fast in all race tracks.”

Marquez added that adapting his way of working to fit within that of the Ducati Lenovo Team will be an important adjustment for him to make. 

As he did from 2023 to 2024, from this year to next Marquez will change almost his whole technical team, only this time he will at least be staying with the same manufacturer.

“So, it will be very nice, and we will try to be super-professional inside the garage, try to work, try to adapt to that style, because again I will change all the human staff, but with the information, with the data we have from this year I think it will be a bit easier.”

Marquez also paid tribute to the Gresini team that gave him the route out of Honda that he was desiring in 2023.

“They became a super-important team in my career, because I arrived in a very deep moment, and it was super-important the move I did last year,” Marquez said following the season finale in Barcelona.

“Thanks to Honda, to understand my situation, thanks to Gresini to give me the opportunity, and all this season I keep working.

“I found a very nice group that helps me a lot to be reborn, to rebuild that confidence, and the best way to say ‘thanks’ is that podium.”

Second place was also enough for Marquez to secure third in the championship — something more important to Gresini than to the eight-times World Champion.

“Third place in the championship, for me was not changing my life, but for a satellite team I asked yesterday [Saturday] to [Michele] Masini [Gresini Racing team manager]: ‘For a satellite team, is it important to finish third?’

“He said ‘Maybe we get some bonus’, so I said ‘Okay, I understand’.

“Then, I tried to be super-precise to finish the race on the podium.”