The eighth round of the 2024 MotoGP World Championship takes place at the famous TT Assen circuit for the MotoGP Dutch TT. Despite losing ground in the championship points at the Italian Grand Prix three weeks ago, Jorge Martin holds a 17-point lead coming into this weekend, but it was the rider second in the standings, Francesco Bagnaia, who took pole position and both victories to reduce his deficit to 10 points.

Dutch TT

Ahead of the start of the Dutch TT, Jorge Martin was handed a three-place grid penalty for cruising in qualifying, and started fifth as a result. Aleix Espargaro didn't start at all after he withdrew following his Sprint crash, and Lorenzo Savadori was also absent having fractured vertebrae in his Sprint crash.

Martin made an excellent start from fifth, and was immediately third, behind Maverick Vinales and Francesco Bagnaia who made the holeshot.

Martin was quickly able to make his way past Vinales and into second place, with now only Bagnaia ahead of him.

Already, though, Bagnaia was almost a second clear in the lead, and that gap continued to increase, incrementally, until the finish. Martin was often able to match Bagnaia's pace, but rarely able to better it, and in the end he watched his closest title rival take his third Grand Prix victory in succession.

Martin was the only rider to run pace anything like Bagnaia's, with the two mostly lapping in the low-1:32s, and in the end the #89 was still over three seconds clear of third-placed Enea Bastianini despite running a 1:34 on the final lap.

Bastianini had come through again from the fourth row, albeit 10th today rather than 11th because of Espargaro's absence. It took him longer to reach the podium on this occasion, but finally he passed Vinales for third with four laps to go.

The battle for the final podium position was the closest throughout the race, with Vinales and Bastianini also fighting against the likes of Fabio Di Giannantonio and Marc Marquez, both of whom curiously slowed at different points of the race, allowing riders behind to pass them.

When Bastianini came through, he took off to the tune of over half-a-second ahead of Vinales, who himself seemed to have secured fourth place on the last lap. But a mistake entering the penultimate corner dropped Vinales back behind Marc Marquez. He crossed the line fifth, behind Marquez in fourth, but was docked a position after the race for touching the green paint on the inside of the left-hander in the final chicane. That meant he was scored in sixth, behind Di Giannantonio who was resultantly promoted to fifth.

Behind, Pedro Acosta crashed out on the final lap. He had been the top-placed KTM rider for much of the race, but his crash gave that position to Brad Binder in seventh. Alex Marquez was behind the South African in eighth, and ahead of Raul Fernandez and Franco Morbidelli who completed the top 10.

Sprint

Francesco Bagnaia won his second straight Sprint of the 2024 MotoGP season at Assen, beating Jorge Martin to turn one and leading every lap from that point onwards.

Bagnaia's victory was a controlled one, squeezing out a gap tenth-by-tenth, until a fastest lap of the race on lap seven seemed to break Martin. From there, Bagnaia and Martin were fairly even on pace, until the Spaniard rolled it back in the final couple of laps, letting the gap creep up to 2.3 seconds.

For Bagnaia, it was a second straight Sprint win and a fourth straight win including Grands Prix. Bagnaia is now unbeaten since he crashed out of the lead on the final lap of the Catalan Sprint.

Behind Martin Maverick Vinales rounded out the podium over two seconds clear of Enea Bastianini. The Italian had cut his way through from 11th on the grid to fourth in about half Sprint distance, but he was already too far behind Vinales to think about the podium.

Fabio Di Giannantonio finished fifth. He was under pressure from Aleix Espargaro on the final lap, but a crash for the #41 Aprilia rider at the penultimate corner meant there was no late Timmer Chicane pass to be made by Espargaro. Brad Binder was sixth, ahead of Alex Marquez, Fabio Quartararo, Franco Morbidelli, and Pedro Acosta who rounded out the top 10.

Marc Marquez was in podium contention early on from seventh on the grid, but crashed at turn two on the second lap when he took marginally too much inside kerb.

After the Sprint, Alex Marquez was awarded a three-second time penalty for not serving a long lap penalty awarded for track limits violations. The additional time relegated Marquez to eighth place and promoted Fabio Quartararo to seventh.

Qualifying

Francesco Bagnaia entered qualifying for the MotoGP Dutch TT as favourite for pole having topped every session before qualifying.

It was potential he delivered on, narrowly beating Jorge Martin with a lap that was almost a second under the lap record set by Marco Bezzecchi in qualifying in 2023.

Bezzecchi played no part in the pole position battle this year, having crashed in first FP2 and then again in Q2, leaving him down in 14th.

Bagnaia's closest challenger was Jorge Martin, who had a messy Q2, especially on his second run, but still managed to get within 0.081 seconds of the pole position time, although there was nothing he could do in the end to stop Bagnaia taking his first pole position of the season.

Maverick Vinales completed the front row in third place, ahead of Alex Marquez, Aleix Espargaro, and Fabio Di Giannantonio on row two.

Espargaro was fortunate to finish the session, after being dive-bombed by Marc Marquez at turn seven. The #41 managed to avoid Marquez, who had come from behind to make the pass at what is one of the fastest corners on the circuit with little braking, but the #93 crashed which limited his own qualifying to seventh.

Joining Marquez on row three are Franco Morbidelli and Brad Binder, while Pedro Acosta, Enea Bastianini, and Raul Fernandez make up row four.

FP2

Francesco Bagnaia maintained his dominance of the Dutch TT so far by topping FP2 on Saturday morning.

Just under 0.1 seconds back of Bagnaia was Maverick Vinales, while Pedro Acosta was third. Marc Marquez was fourth, ahead of Jorge Martin who rounded out the top five. while Franco Morbidelli was sixth-fastest. Fabio Di Giannantonio, Alex Marquez, Raul Fernandez, and Aleix Espargaro completed the top 10.

There were big crashes for both Marco Bezzecchi and Raul Fernandez at turn seven. The latter's off pulled gravel onto the circuit, which brought out the red flag.

Technically speaking, there were updates brought to all four Ducati GP23 riders: Gresini Racing's Alex Marquez and Marc Marquez, and Fabio Di Giannantonio and Marco Bezzecchi of the VR46 Racing Team. The update is aerodynamic and brings the downwash ducts and accompanying front wheel turning veins that Ducati introduced to the factory bikes at the 2023 Austrian GP.

PR

Francesco Bagnaia topped Practice in Assen for the MotoGP riders, the reigning champion ending Friday 0.065 seconds clear of Maverick Vinales.

Vinales' teammate, Aleix Espargaro, was one of a couple of riders to crash in the session, but his was of particular importance because it happened at the final chicane with two minutes to go, which pretty much prevented anyone from improving in the final stages due to yellow flags.

It didn't look likely that anyone would challenge Bagnaia's 1:31.340, but for the likes of Fabio Quartararo, who narrowly missed out on the top 10, it was a costly yellow.

Bagnaia's closest challenger at the top, Vinales, was the only rider to get within 0.3 seconds of the Italian, with Alex Marquez 0.320 seconds adrift in third, just ahead of Espargaro, while Jorge Martin rounded out the top five albeit in some apparent discomfort with his Desmosedici GP24.

Marc Marquez was sixth, ahead of Brad Binder and Enea Bastianini, who fell at turn eight late on. Raul Fernandez was as high as fourth at one point, but ended up ninth, while Franco Morbidelli rose late on from 16th to 10th to knock out Quartararo from the automatic Q2 spots.

FP1

Fabio Di Giannantonio appeared to have set the best time in MotoGP FP1 in Assen, but a track limits violation at the final chicane meant his best lap was cancelled and Francesco Bagnaia was promoted into top spot for opening practice in the Netherlands.

Bagnaia was 0.065 seconds ahead of the rider who will be his factory Ducati teammate in 2025, Marc Marquez, while Raul Fernandez was third. Fabio Quartararo and Maverick Vinales rounded out the top five.

Aleix Espargaro was sixth-fastest on the second factory Aprilia, while Di Giannantonio's best legal lap put him seventh, ahead of Alex Marquez (another rider to have his best lap cancelled), Brad Binder, and Jorge Martin who completed the top 10.