After five days across two circuits in two weeks (plus the shakedown for those with dispensation to run at it), 2025 MotoGP pre-season testing is already over.
And some riders - a pair of brothers in particular - end it with plenty to smile about.
Marc Marquez has to be the favourite
From an impressive time attack that didn't even take place in optimum track conditions to a super-fast and consistent race run of 23 laps, Marquez ticked off all the boxes to go into the opening race weekend later this month as the favourite.
But that was more or less preordained by his status as a works Ducati rider anyway. More notable is that he seems to have an early edge over team-mate Pecco Bagnaia at this track.
Bagnaia had endured a rather messy two-day test, one that did seem to right itself towards the end but didn't allow him to emulate his team-mate in doing a race simulation. His time attack was slower, compromised by factors that he didn't go into - "something outside of our business, I think for the race weekend won't be a problem".
His estimation is that he's "95%" ready and will be at 100% in the race - and Bagnaia is never to be counted out when there's still track time to improve - but while test one at Sepang was more or less level, for now Marquez is the stronger proposition at Buriram.
Alex Marquez is really in the game
That this is Alex Marquez's best chance yet at really making some noise in MotoGP was clear already without a single lap in testing - his first three years had been with an ever-diminished Honda, he didn't have enough experience to maximise the 2022-spec Ducati in '23, and the 2023-spec Ducati wasn't the bike to have in '24.
Still, conceiving it in theory is one thing but seeing the cast-iron evidence in practice is another, and it is clear the younger Marquez heads into the 2025 campaign as a no-doubt frontrunner.
He spent all days of post-season testing right at or near the top of the timing screens - and while you'd expect that at Sepang, which may as well name a corner after him at this point, it's something else to see it at Buriram.
The only slight blemish was a Thursday race simulation that petered out due to a "human mistake" on the electronics setting and a spike in front tyre temperature and pressure - but the younger Marquez was confident in dismissing it as unrepresentative.
Brother Marc described him as the "biggest surprise of the pre-season", clarifying this was "not because he's my brother".
"When he has everything under control and when he has a bike that he can ride in a good way - because he's super sensitive to a bike, he understands very well what he needs - but when he achieves that feeling, he rides super fast," said Marc - and his words ring particularly true when you recall Alex's time in Moto2 or those bewildering podiums as a Repsol Honda rookie in 2020.
If anything, there might be a tinge of regret from Alex's side that his elder brother is set to campaign a 'more GP24 than GP25' bike - because otherwise the scope of opportunity with an uber-polished 2024 Ducati may have been even greater.
Ducati's 2024 decision shows extent of margin
The factory-contracted Ducati riders are set to go into the season without a new engine and without, to begin with, a new chassis.
Bagnaia described the bike he and Marquez will race as a 'GP24.9' but that does seem a little charitable. Truthfully, though, on evidence from last year and this year's pre-season testing even a 'GP24.2' should be enough, despite the gains being made by rivals (Aprilia in particular, going by Buriram).
It is, meanwhile, a relevant decision for riders like the younger Marquez - those with hand-me-down GP24s who will have been hoping to make hay in the early rounds while the newer Ducatis are still being polished.
Now that opportunity is lessened - but it also means the gap between older-spec and newer-spec shouldn't ever balloon too much, certainly not to the levels seen last year.
Honda and Yamaha swapping roles
At Sepang the new Yamaha dazzled with its single-lap gains in particular. At Buriram it was Honda's turn - to a lesser extent, but comparing favourably to the Buriram-spec Yamaha.
Yamaha benchmark Fabio Quartararo estimated "two-three tenths" went begging in time attack due to a lack of feeling with the front tyre, which puzzled him all through the test. That seems about right, because you'd expect Quartararo to be further clear of Jack Miller - who had a fabulous test with Pramac but isn't supposed to be this close to Quartararo this early into his Yamaha stint.
Whereas Honda outperformed expectations in Thailand - eye-catchingly strong in Luca Marini's hands out of the box, then genuinely superb in Joan Mir's hands on Thursday.
Mir was quick over a single lap - but while LCR stablemate Johann Zarco predicted during the day that Honda might be in a situation where its qualifying may have to compensate for shaky race pace, Mir then cast doubt on that by firing in a pretty strong sprint simulation, on par with Quartararo's and not that far off the best sprint sim of the test, set by an Aprilia.
Speaking of...
Aprilia got the right guy
Coming off a Sepang test in which Marco Bezzecchi had set his best laptime at the track yet, at Buriram he set not just his best time ever but Aprilia's, too.
Generally that's par for the course for a test, and Bezzecchi didn't see it as massively significant, but it does underline what was obviously a great pre-season on a bike riders don't always find very straightforward at first contact.
"Of course the adaptation took time - and I think that I'm still adapting in some areas of the riding," Bezzecchi said.
"But to be honest it's a bike that gave me immediately a good front confidence - this is a good key to adapt quite well, when you have front feeling everything becomes a little bit easier."
Having already set a solid time on Thursday morning, he closed out the test with an even better single-lap effort in the afternoon - and, as mentioned above, his sprint simulation was superb, too.
It's a great sign for the long term - but even in the short term Aprilia can be increasingly confident that, in that period Jorge Martin will be working himself back to full fitness, Bezzecchi can hold the fort.
Aprilia's satellite team... also got the right guy
Reigning Moto2 champion Ai Ogura had impressed already through Sepang and the first day at Buriram - but it was getting into that mid-1m29s range on the final day that really caught the attention.
Even his peers noticed. Fellow newcomer Fermin Aldeguer said Ogura was "making the difference" at Buriram and hinted that he expected a stern challenge for 'rookie of the year' from the Japanese, while Trackhouse team-mate Raul Fernandez said he "will be a surprise for this year".
Ogura had lacked under braking - lacking the experience to apply sufficient pressure - but "kind of broke the wall" on Thursday to find what he described as around a quarter of a second.
In the meantime, he has clearly endeared himself to his team and its partner manufacturer.
The KTM newcomers aren't finding it easy
Testing laptimes lie, but these ones don't - Maverick Vinales and Enea Bastianini didn't go any faster in testing because they can't yet.
There is no doubting either's credentials, but for now their performance level seems closer to poor Augusto Fernandez's hopeless 2024 season than KTM's new standard-bearer Acosta.
"It goes without saying that it's not so obvious at the moment. It would be a lie to say that we're targeting a podium or a top five," Tech3 team manager Nicolas Goyon told MotoGP.com during the test.
Both Vinales and Bastianini have struggled to get their heads around getting the RC16 into a corner yet because it is very different to what they'd ridden before.
Vinales has been more optimistic than Bastianini throughout - the latter admitting that there were points in testing he's found himself frustrated with the adaptation - and that's probably reflected in the laptime gap, with Vinales' late-Thursday time attack suggesting a credible step forward.
Raul Fernandez got what he needed
We at The Race are fairly consistent when it comes to not liking it so much when riders rush back after injury - but gritting his teeth through the pain was pretty clearly worth it for Raul Fernandez.
After getting his Sepang injury diagnosis, which included a metacarpal fracture, Fernandez was already pretty confident he could ride in the second test - he'd fractured the equivalent metacarpal on the other hand back in his Moto2 days and it didn't stop him from winning at Aragon a week later.
His confidence was well-placed, as he logged triple-digit laps across the two days.
Were they particularly fast laps? Maybe not (although that's without a time attack or sprint simulation or long race simulation). Was he fatigued and in pain? Obviously, though he was also fortunate this is a right-hander-dominated circuit - because he couldn't really push on left-handers, at least to begin with.
In the end, he goes into the season opener not only retaining the hope of being 95-100% fit, but unlike fellow Sepang injuries Martin and Fabio Di Giannantonio he won't be flying blind. The set-up is "more or less" sorted already - so he needn't write off the first round as just a test.
KTM is doing something to the tyre
The main KTM team's riders, unlike their 19 peers also in attendance, didn't speak to the print media during the test - which probably isn't connected to the fact that KTM's plan for navigating insolvency is facing a fresh challenge from one of the creditors ahead of the key February 25 vote, but is unfortunate timing nonetheless.
Amid all that, the timing screens looked just about par for the course for Pedro Acosta and Brad Binder - but the rear tyres on their RC16s looked less so.
Both Binder and Acosta were seen returning to the pits at certain moments with the centre of their Michelin slick on the rear absolutely chewed through - which, unless they significantly exceeded the tyre life prescriptions, could be something of a concern.
That concern is also potentially corroborated by the fact that, while the peak laptimes were a-OK, the drop-off over a race simulation was considerable.
