We are onto the second set of predictions, and fittingly, these are of the two-wheel variety.
A number of changes are coming to some of the biggest motorcycle championships in the world. Riders are switching manufacturers. Some are changing series. Plenty of riders are attempting to comeback from injuries. There is never a dull moment, and with that, we try to gaze into the future and predict what will happen in a form of motorsports that is constantly getting turned upside down.
MotoGP
1. Marc Márquez longest sprint race winning streak will not be longer than five races
Márquez won 13 sprint races in 2025 before his season was cut short at the Indonesia round. He opened the season with six consecutive sprint victories before he was second in the Silverstone sprint race behind his brother Álex Márquez.
After Silverstone, Marc Márquez won the next seven sprint races.
He might still be the best rider in the world in 2026, and Ducati still might be the best bike, but we surely are not going to see the same level of dominance. Right? He was on pace for 15.8889 sprint victories before his injury. Surely, he isn't going to repeat that.
Even if he wins five consecutive sprint races multiple times during the 2026 season but never more than five, he would still have at most 19 sprint races victories. He could be super and still have this prediction come in correct. I think the competition will step up a level in 2026 and Márquez will winner fewer sprint races, but he could still even if he remains on top.
2. Aprilia has multiple multi-race winning streaks
Aprilia was halfway to this prediction at the end of 2025. Aprilia ended up winning three of the final four races, including the final two. Yes, these came without Marc Márquez on the grid, but Marco Bezzecchi was rising in the second-half of 2025, and Bezzecchi also won the British Grand Prix. Raúl Fernández won the Australian Grand Prix with Trackhouse, and we should be getting a healthy Jorge Martín back.
If Martín and Bezzecchi combined to bring the fight to Ducati, it is not crazy to think Martín could win at Le Mans and Bezzecchi then win at Barcelona before later in the season seeing Martín win consecutive races at Misano and the Austrian Grand Prix.
Add in the testing results with the end of the 2025 season, Aprilia is poising to be a threat, at least a greater one to Ducati.
3. Pedro Acosta will finish on the podium before either Ducati rider on a year-old bike
In the first 11 races of the 2025 season, Acosta had zero podium finishes. In the second 11 races, Acosta had five podium finishes. Next season, Fermín Aldeguer and Franco Morbidelli will be on the Ducati Desmosedici GP25, Aldeguer with Gresini and Morbidelli with VR46.
Aldeguer did have three podium finishes last year, and he won at Indonesia. Morbidelli had two third-place finishes in the first four races, and then he didn't finish on the podium again.
Acosta is doing more with less at KTM, a manufacturer that has plenty of financial concerns away from the racetrack. He was able to finish fourth in the championship, beating Francesco Bagnaia. Acosta could get on the podium in the first race from Thailand. I don't think his 2026 season will start as slowly as 2025 did.
4. Toprak Razgatlioglu will score majority of his points in the second half of the season
The World Superbike champion is heading to MotoGP in 2026, and Razgatlioglu will be on the Pramac Yamaha.
Yamaha has not been in a great spot the last few seasons. Last year, Fabio Quartararo was ninth in the championship, but his only podium finish was second at Jerez. Jack Miller was the next closest Yamaha rider in 17th, 122 points behind Quartararo. Álex Rins had 68 points over the entire season while Miguel Oliveria had 43 points, though Oliveira missed four races.
There will be a learning curve for Razgatlioglu. There will be a number of new circuits to him. He will be learning a new bike that might not be the most competitive. It could take a few rounds to adjust, but once he does, Razgatlioglu could start producing. The goal should be to beat Miller. If 80 points is enough, I think Razgatlioglu can get there.
5. A Honda rider cracks the championship top ten
This is the wild one because I am not sure what reasoning can be used to justify this other than Honda was better in 2025 and it was better across the board.
Johan Zarco was vaulted up to 12th in the championship thanks in part to a victory at Le Mans and a second as Silverstone. Luca Marini was only six points behind Zarco. Joan Mir did get 15th in the championship and he was third at Motegi and Sepang.
Somkiat Chantra has been replaced with Moto2 champion Diogo Moreira. I think there is enough consistency that can allow Zarco to sneak into the top ten. I would say Marini is the next likeliest rider to do it. It does fell like Mir is too prone to a fall to trust he can put enough results to snag tenth. Expecting the top ten out of Moreira is asking for too much.
6. Rookie and sophomore riders will combine to win at least 12 Moto2 races
During the 2025 Moto2 season, rookies and sophomores combined for 11 victories.
Sophomore Diogo Moreira led the way with four victories. Senna Agius won twice. Deniz Öncü also won twice.
Rookie Daniel Holgado won twice while David Alonso won in Hungary.
That is a pretty good pull, but I would expect Holgado and Alonso to win more in 2026. They could win four or five races between them. Then you have José Antonio Rueda and Ángel Piqueras moving up from Moto3 after they finished 1-2 in the championship, and Taiyo Furusato is also moving up, and he ended the season with three consecutive podium finishes, including a victory in Malaysia.
Rueda will be returning after missing the last three Moto3 races due to injuries suffered during his formation lap crash with Noah Dettwiler. It will be curious to see Rueda's form, and he might not be quite in the position to compete for race victories.
There could be a surprise winner. Collin Veijer or Iván Ortolá could win in their sophomore Moto2 season and contribute to this prediction.
World Superbike
7. There will be at least two first-time winners
Toprak Razgatlioglu is gone. Jonathan Rea has retired. The grid has lost some fire power, and it has opened the door.
The championship will still be Nicolò Bulega's to lose. Bulega was the one threat Razgalioglu faced on a regular basis over the last two seasons. Bulega is going to win a lion's share of the races, but the door will be open to others, like Bulega's Ducati teammate Iker Lecuona.
Lecuona moved over after four seasons at Honda which yielded only two position. The Ducati will only cure so much, but it will help Lecuona.
There is also Miguel Oliveira, who essentially swapped seats with Razgatlioglu, and filled the BMW vacancy.
Those are the two favorites, but there is also Andrea Iannone and Sam Lowes, two quick riders on smaller Ducati teams. Jake Dixon is moving to World Superbike with Honda after racing in Moto2. It is a stretch, but Dixon is a contender. Stefano Manzi is moving up with Yamaha after winning the World Supersport title.
With how World Superbike has gone for the better part of the last decade, it is hard to see this being a slam dunk, but it is a possibility.
8. Three British riders finish in the championship top ten
In 2025, Alex and Sam Lowes were sixth and eighth in the championship respectively. Both are remaining with their respective teams, Bimota for Alex and Elf Marc VDS Racing Team for Sam. I think another Brit joins them in the championship top ten.
The leader is Jake Dixon. Dixon won seven times in his Moto2 career, and that included two finishes in the championship top five. It could be Tarran Mackenzie, who was struggled to finish 19th in the championship last year, but Mackenzie switched teams and manufacturers midseason, leaving the Petronas MIE Racing Honda Team to join MGM Bonovo Racing Ducati outfit, where Mackenzie will start the 2026 season.
In those 12 races with MGM Bonovo, Mackenzie had nine finishes in points after having four in all the first 18 races.
We have had at least three British riders in the World Superbike championship top ten as recently as 2022 when Jonathan Rea was third, Alex Lowes was sixth and Scott Redding was eighth,
9. A World Supersport round will be swept by a rider that does not end up as champion
Last season, there were three instances where a rider swept a weekend in World Supersport. All three of those were from champion Stefano Manzi.
Manzi will not be back in 2026, and World Supersport is in the midst of a competition revival. Someone else will sweep a weekend, but that rider will not be fortunate to be champion.
Prior to 2025, there have been four consecutive seasons where a non-champion swept a weekend. Last season was only the second time since doubleheader weekend were introduced in 2020 that it did not happen.
SuperMotocross
10. The Lawrence brothers will combine for at least 20 podium finishes in the Supercross season
Both Lawrence brothers were injured and missed most of the 2025 Supercross season. They returned for the Motocross season and smoked the field with Jett taking another championship while Hunter was second.
If they are both healthy for the entire Supercross season, they could repeat that performance. It is asking a lot. Hunter has yet to have a clean Supercross season in the 450cc class. We know Jett is brilliant, but in his one full season of Supercross, he had his low moments.
In 2024, Jett did have ten podium finishes, eight of which were victories. It will require Jett at least matching that output and Hunter doing the same for this prediction to be correct.
11. Four of the championship top five in Supercross will be different from 2025
Both Lawrence brother is returning from an injury-abbreviated 2025 Supercross season.
Eli Tomac is returning and he will be at KTM. Jorge Prado will be Tomac's teammate at KTM, along with Aaron Plessinger, as the Spaniard makes his second attempt at a full Supercross season. Jason Anderson is also returning and has moved to Suzuki.
That is five notable riders returning from injury, and four you feel confident could crack the championship top five.
We haven't even mentioned RJ Hampshire, who is moving up to the 450cc class and scheduled to be on the Husqvarna alongside Stewart. Hampshire was fifth in the 450cc Motocross season, but he suffered a broken scapula and ribs in a training accident during the offseason.
There will be a shakeup, but it will be a contentious battle. Cooper Webb is the defending champion and remains teammates with Justin Cooper. Chase Sexton made a late push for the title last year, and Sexton has now moved to Kawasaki. Malcolm Stewart is coming off his best season of his career and ended 2025 with a victory at the Paris Supercross event. Ken Roczen should be back, though he too missed races due to injury. However, missing the final two rounds did not cost Roczen fifth in the championship.
It is difficult to imagine it will be a straight line change with five guys in and five guys out. I cannot see either Lawrence brother missing. Tomac is a question mark, but he had finished in the Supercross championship top five for ten consecutive seasons prior to last year, and he was third in the Motocross championship. Prado could be a surprise, and Anderson is always suffocatingly consistent.
We can at least feel confident that 2026 will not look identical to 2025.
12. Aaron Plessinger will not have the most third-place finishes in Supercross
Speaking of riders who were not in the top five of the Supercross championship last year, Plessinger was sixth, and he did win in Foxborough. However, one of the reasons Plessinger was sixth in the championship is he had the most third-place finishes in 2025.
Four times was Plessinger the third-place finisher. Chase Sexton, Justin Cooper and Jason Anderson each had three third-place finishes.
With the number of riders returning after missing most of the 2025 season, I don't see how Plessinger will finish third that many times. I am not sure he is going to be better than third among the KTM riders. He may get on the podium a few times, but I don't think it will be consistent enough to end up with the most third-place finishes for a second consecutive season.
NASCAR predictions, check. Motorcycle predictions, check. We get a little break, and soon we will be giving out some presents before resuming predictions.
