Jorge Lorenzo knows Marc Marquez well. He faced him on the track and got to know him as a teammate when they were in Honda under the same roof. Now that the rider from Mallorca is out of the picture, Jorge is singing Marc's praises, like he did in an interview with to AS.
According to Lorenzo, in the current MotoGP line-up, there's no other rider on Marquez's level. "Right now, no. The results prove it," he explained. "The fact that Bagnaia has the same bike as he does and Di Giannantonio also has it, as well as two or three riders who have a slightly inferior bike but, basically, between 2024 and 2025, they say there isn't much difference, and all of them can't even come close to achieving the same performance as Marc... This shows, race after race and circuit after circuit, that Marc isn't only one step ahead right now but, for me, he's two steps ahead of everybody."
Logically, the one who noticed it best and first of all was Bagnaia, his teammate.
"In the end, what destroys you the most is when you take off your helmet, look at the times, and see that your teammate beat you by half a second or a second. More than I can say off the track, in statements, in that famous psychological warfare that, for example, was said to be so strong between Valentino Rossi and Gibernau, Capirossi, Biaggi. Simply, Valentino was a little bit faster than them on almost every track and beat them on the track. Because, if both Gibernau and Biagi and Capirossi had been half a second faster than Valentino, all that psychological warfare off the track would've been for nothing," Jorge noted, and he spoke from firsthand experience.
"What baffles your teammate is your superiority in terms of speed, which was, in my case, what happened in 2012 with Ben Spies. I was clearly faster than Ben Spies, and he started to collapse psychologically, and that's kind of what's happening with Bagnaia and Márquez," he continued. "Bagnaia definitely didn't expect that speed difference with Marc. He thought that, in the worst case scenario, he'd be a bit less fast, or more or less in the norm, but he didn't expect a Márquez that was always superior. That kind of discouraged him a little. It makes you lose confidence in yourself and get on the track with some doubt about your speed, your ability. Whether you want it or not, this is reflected in your subconscious and in the way you ride. A convinced rider, a confident rider, even if he doesn't understand why, gets better results and goes faster. That's how it is. It's pure psychology."
For Lorenzo, Marquez is rightfully among the greatest ever, and even more so now that he's managed to win the title with two different brands in the MotoGP.
"Undoubtedly it's an achievement that makes it even clearer that, if he isn't the best, he's still among the top three best riders in history," he said. "Then there will always be those who'll say Agostini has fifteen titles and that he certainly won't be able to surpass or equal him. But, in terms of talent and speed, if we only look at that, talent and speed, for me, he's the strongest and fastest rider in history. If he were to win with a third brand, there would be no doubt. Those who doubt that he's the best in history would have no argument."
But what's Lorenzo's opinion on the greatest? "In terms of marketing, in terms of personality, in terms of what he brought to motorcycling, in terms of charisma and novelty, Valentino. There will be no one like Valentino, I think. But, in terms of pure speed and pure talent, of not being afraid to explore those limits and always trying to win regardless of the circumstances, regardless of how the bike goes or how you are on that circuit, there's been no one like Marquez, in my opinion. So, if we have to say who's the fastest and most complete rider, that's Marquez."