The epic battle in the Dutch TT at Assen resulted in the first 15 riders crossing the line just 16.043” apart, marking the closest ever top-15 finish of all time. Will the tight, twisty Sachsenring favour more close racing next Sunday?

What’s sure is that the shortest track on the calendar, at 3.67 km, has in recent years proven to be one of the most successful rounds for both Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez and Dani Pedrosa, who have scored 14 victories between them and have stood together on the podium three times, in 2014, 2015 and 2017.

The Championship leader, in particular, has taken eight consecutive wins across three classes at the German circuit, each success coming after starting from pole position. Marc and Dani look forward to round 9 of the season, the former to try and extend his lead in the standings, and the latter to make a breakthrough in his season.

At the Motorrad Grand Prix Deutschland

Marc Marquez has 8 wins: 1 x 125 (2010), 2 x Moto2 (2011, 2012), and 5 x MotoGP (2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017), plus 8 pole positions (he has been on pole for all eight wins).

Dani Pedrosa has 6 wins: 2 x 250 (2004, 2005) and 4 x MotoGP (2007, 2010, 2011, 2012), plus an additional 4 podiums and 1 pole position.

Marc Marquez

“The victory we scored at Assen was important because it was a race where it was incredibly easy to make a mistake but instead we were able to increase our advantage in the Championship. Now we go to a very different circuit where we’re normally very strong, but every year is different; you could object that I often repeat this idea, but it’s true! Weather could play an important role, as we’ve seen in the past: if it’s rainy or mixed, everything will change very quickly and you must be ready. So we’ll see; we’ll go there and try to find our level and be strong from the start of the weekend. Then on Sunday we’ll try and fight for the podium again.”

Dani Pedrosa

“I look forward to the race at Sachsenring, a track that I like. In the second part of the race at Assen, we managed to lap at a better pace than we did during the rest of the weekend, so we’ll try and build on that at Sachsenring. We also must improve our speed when we’re on new tyres in order to be faster in qualifying.”

MotoGP 2018

Rider standings

Pos. Rider Num Nation Points Team Constructor
Location Information

Car and bike races have been held on closed public roads in the area around the town of Chemnitz, Germany since the 1920s and were still taking place until as recently as 1990. It was decided, however, that the five mile course through such a densely populated area was no… read more.

Length 3.671 kilometres / 2.281 miles
Width 12 metres
Left corners 10
Right corners 3
Longest straight 0.700 kilometres / 0.435 miles
Constructed 1996
Modified 2001 (resurfaced in 2017)

Lerchenstraße, 09337 Hohenstein-Ernstthal, Germany - View in Google Maps

www.sachsenring-circuit.com

Records

Pole Position 1m 19.423s (166.3km/h) Jorge Martin (Ducati, 2024)
Race Lap 1m 20.667s (163.8km/h) Jorge Martin (Ducati, 2024)
Race Time 40m 40.087s (162.4km/h) Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati,2024)
2024 Race Winner Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati)
2024 Sprint Winner Jorge Martin (Ducati)