The marshal involved in the shocking incident at the Czechia Grand Prix last weekend has issued a statement on the matter.

MotoGP championship leader Marco Bezzecchi lost his cool after crashing out of the sprint race at the Masaryk Circuit, before storming up to a marshal clearing away his motorcycle and pushing and slapping the face of said marshal.

Bezzecchi was understood to be angered by the fact that the bike was still revving when the marshals were trying to safely clear it away out of the gravel, but the Italian’s behaviour led to a ban from the rest of the weekend’s action.

His Aprilla Racing team initially appealed the ban, but were unsuccessful in doing so, before Bezzecchi then appeared at the circuit, and could be seen apologising to the marshal who had been on the receiving end of his despicable behaviour.

A visibly upset Bezzecchi hugged the marshal, and handed him a present, while also taking to Instagram to issue a public apology.

Now, the marshal has had his say, admitting in an interview that he was ‘shocked’ by the ordeal.

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Bezzecchi incident marshal issues statement

Speaking to TNT Sports, Ladja the marshal – who is a volunteer at the Masaryk Circuit – said: “I’m ok. At that moment I was a bit shocked, and at night when the wave of the video and all of the seeing it, I mean the whole world, I was really down because it’s something new for me.

“He was surely stressed and I understand his situation, he crashed, so I did my job and went for the bike and I picked it up.

“I pressed the clutch and tried to pick it up because it was still on and the bike started rolling so I wanted to put it back down and it revved up.

“He probably thought that I did it on purpose, it was a pure accident and then everyone saw what happened.”

Revealing that he had seen Bezzecchi’s online apology, Ladja continued: “Yes I have seen it, and he just came and apologised to me in person.

“So, I mean, I understand him and I wish him the best of luck. It really matters to me that he apologised.”

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Lewis Hamilton is officially back after that brilliant first victory for Ferrari at the Barcelona-Catalunya Grand Prix, and there is another reason for his army of fans to be very excited.

The 41-year-old has really banished the memories of that awful first season at Maranello by coming back strongly in 2026.

Second-place finishes in Canada and Monaco hinted strongly that the seven-time world champion and his legendary team were finally on the right track, and last Sunday in Spain proved it beyond any doubt.

Hamilton was a comfortable winner as he claimed his first victory of the red, but it was the manner in which the weekend unfolded which was most impressive.

On Sunday Ferrari managed to deliver the car and race strategy Hamilton needed, and he capitalised with a peerless performance to take top spot on the podium.

But perhaps the MOST impressive part of the whole weekend had come 24 hours earlier in qualifying, as Hamilton claimed a front row spot, just 0.064 seconds behind pole sitter George Russell of Mercedes. If you look even deeper still, there was something even more encouraging.

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Ferrari qualifying performance was impressive

Former Ferrari race engineer Rob Smedley highlighted it during the latest High Performance Racing podcast, pinpointing the fact that Lewis was actually ahead of Russell until the Mercedes man turned things around very late in the lap.

Smedley said of Ferrari’s impressive qualifying performance: “He was a tenth up before the last corner on my dark web data, the engineer’s dark web.”

So this was not just superior race strategy and a well-timed virtual safety car which helped Ferrari dethrone a Mercedes team which had won the first six races of the 2026 season. It was much more than that, a raft of upgrades which clearly went a long way to levelling the playing field.

Smedley added: “I don’t think anything seismic has changed because it never does that in Formula 1 – things ebb and flow. Ferrari had a very very good car in Monte Carlo, you saw them with a decent car. They brought a package to Barcelona and it was a very good car.”

2026 Pecking order will be challenged again

The former Ferrari man expects the pecking order to be challenged on an ongoing basis for the rest of the season as those controversial new regulations continue to bed in.

“Now, will they have the best car at the end of the season? Maybe, maybe not – it would be ridiculous to try and call that here now. Because everybody is in this very early stages of development.

“But things are changing – we talked about this from our very first show. With a rule set as immature as this, this will continue to change throughout the season. It’s exciting and it’s good for the fans.”

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Mercedes F1 team have left George Russell fans fuming after failing to mention the British driver in a post debriefing the Barcelona Grand Prix.

Russell crossed the line in P2 at last weekend’s race at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya claiming his third podium of the sport’s new regulations cycle.

Since winning the season-opening Australian GP back in March, Russell has slipped down the drivers’ standings as team-mate Kimi Antonelli has emerged as the favourite for the championship.

After a record-breaking run of five consecutive grand prix wins for the Italian teenager, Antonelli’s luck finally ran out in Spain last weekend when his Mercedes suffered an ‘electrical shutdown’ with four laps to go, ruling him out of the race entirely.

Following Antonelli’s first DNF of the season, Mercedes took to LinkedIn to celebrate the success of their former star driver Lewis Hamilton, who crossed the line nearly 20 seconds ahead of Russell to secure his first grand prix win for new team Ferrari.

But whilst the Silver Arrows social team shone a light on their ‘old friend’ Hamilton and shared commiserations for Antonelli, Russell wasn’t mentioned at all.

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Mercedes omit F1 star Russell from Barcelona GP post

In full, the post read: “A tough day for the Team, but fantastic to see our old friend Lewis Hamilton take his first win in Red for our oldest rivals Scuderia Ferrari HP.

“The Virtual Safety Car may have helped at the final stop, but Lewis drove a fantastic race and is a fully deserving winner.

“We’re dissapointed that another reliability issue has cost us valuable points with Kimi and it’s clear we need to strengthen in this area.

“Today proves that we’ve got a fight on our hands in both Championships ahead of us, but like always we’ll embrace that challenge to stand back on the top step of the podium.

“Now it’s time to regroup and refocus back home at Lauda Drive and come back stronger in Austria in just a few weeks.”

GPFans contacted Mercedes for comment.

Though the images in the post did include snaps of Russell pouring champagne over his old team-mate and posing with fellow podium finisher Lando Norris, the 28-year-old wasn’t mentioned by name in the post.

This angered fans to say the least with many flocking to the comments to question the post.

“I’m not sure I see the fairness in this approach. I don’t know the full context behind your team’s decision, but I hope future posts can provide a more balanced perspective,” read one comment, whilst another noted: “I think a very tongue in cheek post, *disappointed you’ve no mention of your second driver, the VSC wouldn’t of made a difference… it’s like a bitter well done.”

One comment stated: “Congratulations to Lewis on a well-deserved victory. That said, George also delivered a strong performance, securing P2 in his 100th Grand Prix with Mercedes. It would have been nice to see that acknowledged in the team’s statement as well.”

Another social media user simply summarised their disappointment in the F1 squad by writing beneath the post: “Wow not mentioning your other driver that finished second, poor.”

The seventh round of the championship wasn’t just an average race for Russell either.

The six-time grand prix winner celebrated his 100th grand prix driving for the Brackley-based outfit last time out, something which fans felt made the fact that Russell was absent from the post even worse.

But not everyone felt that way given that Russell started the 66-lap race from pole position. One individual commented: “He did start the race from 1st position and ended it in 2nd , so not an overly positive thing,” which caused another to reply: “So why mention Kimis DNF then? Completely ignoring your driver getting on the podium in his 100th race for the team is diabolical.”

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