Bagnaia started from fourth place on the grid but passed Sam Lowes off the line and quickly worked his way past Mattia Pasini, as polesitter Marquez opened a one-second advantage.

Bagnaia chipped away at Marquez’s lead and caught his Marc VDS rival mid-distance, shadowing his opponent, and setting up a move into Turn 11.

Marquez immediately re-passed Bagnaia but the Italian fought back a few laps later, battling through the first sequence of corners before prising the lead away into Turn 11, a position he cemented on the brakes into Turn 12.

Marquez briefly countered but was unable to live with the pace set by Bagnaia, who went on to record a comfortable victory, following on from his triumph in Qatar’s season-opener.

Marquez’s pace dropped off across the closing laps, accentuated by a wild moment through Turn 18, though he resisted a resurgent Miguel Oliveira to take second.

Oliveira started from 12th spot but made light work of his opponents, grabbing third mid-distance, though was unable to bridge the four-second deficit to Marquez, in spite of the latter’s late issues.

Joan Mir staged a strong comeback to take fourth spot, having tumbled out of the top 10 on the opening lap following contact with Luca Marini and Dominique Aegerter.

Third and fourth had belonged to Xavi Vierge and Marcel Schrotter, but both crashed out, the former sliding off at Turn 18, moments after losing a couple of spots, while Schrotter suffered a heavy high-side exiting Turn 1.

Schrotter clutched his left shoulder as he clambered to his feet, before heading to the medical centre for further attention.

Iker Lecuona claimed his best-ever result with fifth spot, picking up the pieces for the CGBM Evolution squad after erstwhile front-row starter Lowes crashed through Turn 18.

Brad Binder made similar progress to Red Bull KTM teammate Oliveira to rise from 16th to sixth, as Pasini slipped back to seventh, his prospects underdone by opting for the harder rear tyre.

Jorge Navarro took eighth spot, another rider to make gains from a low-key grid spot, while Aegerter recovered from his Turn 1 clash with Mir to classify ninth.

Lorenzo Baldassarri rounded out the top 10 for the Pons outfit.

Race results:

Pos.	#	Rider	Bike	Time/Gap
1	42	Francesco Bagnaia	Kalex	39'30.016
2	73	Alex Marquez	Kalex	2.464
3	44	Miguel Oliveira	KTM	3.704
4	36	Joan Mir	Kalex	5.376
5	27	Iker Lecuona	KTM	6.867
6	41	Brad Binder	KTM	6.876
7	54	Mattia Pasini	Kalex	9.308
8	9	Jorge Navarro	Kalex	10.510
9	77	Dominique Aegerter	KTM	10.595
10	7	Lorenzo Baldassarri	Kalex	11.497
11	32	Isaac Viñales	Kalex	12.339
12	24	Simone Corsi	Kalex	13.458
13	10	Luca Marini	Kalex	14.282
14	5	Andrea Locatelli	Kalex	14.548
15	20	Fabio Quartararo	Speed Up	17.169
16	13	Romano Fenati	Kalex	20.609
17	87	Remy Gardner	Tech 3	20.821
18	40	Hector Barbera	Kalex	27.068
19	45	Tetsuta Nagashima	Kalex	27.245
20	64	Bo Bendsneyder	Tech 3	32.144
21	4	Steven Odendaal	NTS	38.350
22	51	Eric Granado	Suter	38.579
23	16	Joe Roberts	NTS	44.257
24	22	Sam Lowes	KTM	45.289
25	89	Khairul Idham Pawi	Kalex	46.966
26	95	Jules Danilo	Kalex	1'10.364
27	63	Zulfahmi Khairuddin	Kalex	1'27.099
28	21	Federico Fuligni	Kalex	1'27.257
Ret	97	Xavi Vierge	Kalex	5 laps
Ret	62	Stefano Manzi	Suter	7 laps
Ret	23	Marcel Schrötter	Kalex	12 laps
Ret	52	Danny Kent	Speed Up	15 laps