Márquez started on pole but quickly fell to fourth behind Jorge Lorenzo, Stefan Bradl and Bradley Smith by turn one. Lorenzo fell later on lap one handing the lead over to the German Bradl. Rossi charged his way up to second from tenth in six laps but not before Márquez got back around the Italian. Bradl would fall while leading just like Lorenzo, handing the lead over Márquez.
Márquez and Rossi would battle for the last half of the race as many other rides had trouble. Andrea Iannone fell while in the top five but was able to continue. Dani Pedrosa and Álvaro Bautista were going back-and-forth for third with Bradley Smith keeping the Spaniards in his sights in fifth. Smith would fall with three to go, the same lap his Tech3 teammate Pol Espargaró pulled into the pit lane and retired. The next lap Bautista would fall, gift-wrapping the final podium spot to Pedrosa.
At the front, Márquez was able to hold off the charging Rossi and pick up his first career MotoGP win at Qatar. He won the 2010 Moto2 Qatar Grand Prix. Aleix Espargaró would finish fourth in his first race for Forward Racing, the top "open" class bike. The Ducatis of Andrea Dovizioso and Cal Crutchlow finished fifth and sixth with Crutchlow coasting to the line. In his MotoGP debut, Scott Redding held off a hard charging Nicky Hayden for seventh with Colin Edwards finishing ninth for Forward Racing. Iannone recovered from his early fall to finish in the top ten.
Hayden's Drive M7 Aspar teammate Hiroshi Aoyama finished eleventh with Yonny Hernández in twelfth. Karel Abraham finished thirteenth. Danilo Petrucci finished fourteenth with Australian Broc Parkes rounding out the points in fifteenth, scoring on debut.
Márquez starts 2014 where he left off in 2013, leading the championship. He holds a five point lead over Rossi with Pedrosa nine back. A. Espargaró is twelve back. Dovizioso has eleven points, one ahead of his teammate Crutchlow. Redding has nine points, Hayden eight, Edwards seven, Iannone six and Aoyama five. Hernández had four points while Abraham has three after scoring five points through the whole 2013 season. Petrucci has two points with Parkes has one.
The next MotoGP race takes place on April 13, three weeks away, from Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas. Marc Márquez picked up his first career MotoGP win in the inaugural Grand Prix of America last year from pole position. It will be the first of two races in the United States as Laguna Seca and the United States Grand Prix was left off the 2014 schedule. The Indianapolis Grand Prix will take place August 10.
