Marc Marquez to return from injury for Italian Grand Prix following surgery
Published 26/05/2026 at 18:41 GMT+1
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Reigning MotoGP champion Marc Marquez is set to return from injury for the Italian Grand Prix this weekend, his team Ducati said on Tuesday.
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Video credit: TNT Sports
Marquez required surgery after fracturing his foot in a highside crash at Le Mans earlier in May, while he also underwent shoulder surgery, which had previously been scheduled for a later date.
The two operations meant the 33-year-old missed the French Grand Prix race and his home Catalan Grand Prix weekend.
"Following a positive medical check, Marc will travel to Mugello tomorrow," Ducati said in a statement.
"He is scheduled for a final trackside assessment on Thursday to secure the 'fit to race' clearance for the Italian Grand Prix."
Marquez’s brother, Alex, will miss the Grand Prix in Italy and Hungary after suffering a marginal fracture in a vertebra near his neck and a collarbone fracture during a horror crash in Barcelona.
Ducati's Italian test rider Michele Pirro will replace Alex on the Gresini Racing bike.
Marc Marquez is currently ninth in the overall standings, without a podium finish this season, 10 points behind Alex, who sits in seventh place, and 85 points behind leader Marco Bezzecchi.
A behind-the-scenes video from Ducati showed Marquez confiding in his team at the French Grand Prix, discussing his injury struggles.
”There’s a screw that’s giving me nerve problems. On and off," said Marquez.
"You can’t ride a motorbike … on and off. I knew this was happening. That’s why the operation was already scheduled after the Catalunya GP.
”I’m riding with one-and-a-half arms. They have to remove a broken screw that, in the crash in Indonesia, they saw it moved."
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He continued: ”After Jerez, I went for a check-up. I felt something was wrong. When I get into the riding position, that broken screw … after Indonesia, it moved and touches the nerve.
”[It’s] the nerve I use for three fingers and the whole [right] arm. It takes away my strength.
"Yesterday, in the time attack, you asked me what happened in that corner. I knew what happened in that corner ... and today too. For a few laps, everything is fine. A few laps later, not so.”
Practice for this weekend’s Grand Prix begins on Friday, live on TNT Sports and HBO Max, before Saturday’s qualifying and Sunday’s race.
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