Marc Marquez beats Bezzecchi to San Marino Grand Prix Sprint victory - TimesLIVE

Ducati’s Marc Marquez pulled off the perfect getaway to beat Aprilia’s home favourite Marco Bezzecchi and win Saturday’s San Marino Grand Prix sprint, closing to within 14 points of MotoGP championship leader Jorge Martin who finished third.

Bezzecchi had smashed the lap record to take pole ahead of Marquez in qualifying but it was the Ducati rider who had the perfect launch off the line before diving on the inside of turn one to storm into the lead.

From there, the reigning champion never looked back, though he had to work for his win as Bezzecchi initially matched his pace before Marquez found another gear to pull clear.

“Immediately when I started, the plan was to try to lead the race because I had the medium tyre and Bezzecchi was with the soft (tyre),” Marquez said.

“There were laps when they were a bit dangerous but then I tried to push. I see that I opened a gap. I tried to relax a bit and I saw that Marco was coming back.

“Then I attacked in the last laps because the pace was there. I was just trying to manage the risk. Happy with this victory, but the most important (race) is tomorrow.”

Bezzecchi was initially faster in the early stages of the sprint but once Marquez got into his groove, he began setting fastest laps and built a lead of more than a second over the Aprilia rider by the halfway stage of the 13-lap sprint.

Fabio Di Giannantonio had slotted into third but his focus was more on Martin behind him as the Aprilia rider sought to limit any damage in the standings, with the Spaniard eventually moving up to third on lap seven with an overtake on the inside.

“Honestly, I didn’t want to risk a lot to overtake him,” Martin said. “I’m really happy with the job of the team ... and I hope that tomorrow we can improve a bit.”

Bezzecchi managed to reel in Marquez to get within striking distance towards the end but the Ducati rider quickly responded with a race lap record on the penultimate lap before taking the chequered flag.

Bezzecchi, third in the standings, is now 22 points off top spot following his best sprint result of the season after finishing third four times.

“I’m very, very happy. My best result in the sprint — finally better than third, so it’s a big result,” he said.

Di Giannantonio finished fourth while Gresini Racing’s Alex Marquez rounded out the top five. KTM’s Pedro Acosta finished sixth followed by Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse), Fermin Aldeguer (Gresini) and Luca Marini (Honda) who finished in the points.

South Africa’s Brad Binder finished 14th.