Pecco Bagnaia’s vow: “Don’t make any more mistakes wanting more”
Factory Ducati rider Pecco Bagnaia outlines where needs to improve
Pecco Bagnaia has identified his key lesson about "mistakes" after finishing third at the MotoGP Qatar Grand Prix.
The double premier class champion was expected to be strong in Qatar and take the fight to team-mate Marc Marquez ahead of the fourth round of the season.
But Marquez completed his third clean sweep of 2025, while Pecco Bagnaia struggled to eighth in the sprint and could get no higher than third in the grand prix from 11th on the grid after a crash in qualifying.
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He was promoted to second after a post-race penalty for Maverick Vinales, leading to Ducati’s first factory team 1-2 of the season with Marquez winning.
Bagnaia blamed his Saturday sprint struggles on a recurring balance issue caused by a smaller fuel tank, though he says “it’s not possible” that he can have these problems while in grands prix he can fight for the podium.
Asked by TNT Sport what he needs to improve going forward, Bagnaia said: “First of all, I cannot make any more mistakes like I did in qualifying because I cannot start from the fourth row.
“Maximum is the second and that’s already a bad result.
“So, this is the first thing to improve - don’t make any more mistakes wanting more.
“Then the next is to understand what to do in the sprint because it’s not possible to lose time and not have the same chance as the Sunday race to create chances to overtake.”
Read more: Why masterful Marc Marquez Qatar MotoGP win is a hammer blow to his title rivals
Bagnaia believes a better qualifying could have seen him have a better chance of battling with team-mate Marc Marquez.
As for finishing third on the road, he said he learned from his eight non-scores last season and gave up his chase in the latter stages after using up his medium rear tyre.
“I was pushing hard and from that position, to overtake riders it was very important to use the rear tyre a lot,” he added.
“I tried to manage the rear but I was pushing hard when I was battling with Franky [Morbidelli], I lost a lot of time and to come back to gain this half-second maybe I pushed too much and the last four, five laps I was completely out of rear tyre.
“I tried to be faster but it wasn’t possible. Sometimes, like I learn from last year, it’s better to finish where you are.
“I think that if I was starting from more in front, at least a battle was more of a chance.
“Battling with Marc was more of a chance because I think the pace was very similar and without pushing that much in the first part of the race I was arriving in the last part with more tyres and it was possible to fight more.
“But it’s impossible to know, it’s impossible to say something. Let’s be happy for what happened and try to improve for the next one and not make the same mistake as yesterday.”
