Valencia (Spain) (AFP)

Spaniard Marc Marquez (Honda), already crowned for the sixth time MotoGP World Champion, was again untouchable Sunday in the last race of the season in Valencia, Frenchman Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha-SRT) finishing again on his heels.

By winning his 12th MotoGP victory of the year (and the 56th of his career in the premier class), Marquez, 26, has shown that he remains the undisputed master of the discipline and equal his record of success in a season dating of 2014.

"It has been a difficult weekend because we have tried new things," said Marquez, already looking ahead to 2020 and a seventh title that would allow him to match his rival, Italy's Valentino Rossi.

"It's a perfect season that will be difficult to repeat," he conceded while Honda has also already won the constructor title and won Sunday the team.

Despite starting second in the grid behind Quartararo, the Spanish champion went one by one to finish with more than a second ahead of the Frenchman who led during the first laps.

The 20-year-old Frenchman earned his 5th place on Sunday for his first MotoGP season, finishing fifth in the World Championship standings.

"Nobody could have imagined at the beginning of the season that I would have 6 pole positions and 7 podiums, it's amazing to finish the season this way," he said.

His 2nd place also gives Yamaha 2nd place in the constructors' rankings even though Australian Jack Miller (Ducati-Pramac) finished 3rd Sunday.

This was the last race for triple Spanish world champion Jorge Lorenzo, Marc Marquez's team-mate at Honda, who announced his retirement at 32. He finished 13th, at the end of a very difficult season.

- Who in Lorenzo's place? -

Her place in the champion team of the world arouses all the desires. Alex Marquez, world champion Moto2 this year, could join his older brother but the drivers of the team LCR, Honda satellite, also eye on it.

Both fell on Sunday, first British Cal Crutchlow then Frenchman Johann Zarco, then badly mowed by the bike of the Spaniard Iker Lecuona (KTM) who played his first race in MotoGP and fell just behind him.

Led to the circuit hospital for exams, the 29-year-old Frenchman then returned to his stand limping.

Dismissed from KTM mid-season, the Cannois has been able to perform the last three races of the season at LCR to replace the Japanese Takaaki Nakagami, injured. Without demerit, his results however leave a big question mark on his future in MotoGP and he could "go down" in Moto2 where he was champion in 2015 and 2016.

In other categories, South Africa's Brad Binder (KTM) won his third consecutive victory in Moto2 where Alex Marquez has already been crowned. Binder, 24, will be competing next year in MotoGP for the Austrian team.

In Moto3, Spaniard Sergio Garcia won his first victory for his inaugural season at the age of 16 in the category that has crowned the Italian Lorenzo Dalla Porta this year. The race was dotted with many accidents, then interrupted by a red flag and finally cut short.

The last title still in play, that of MotoE (for electric), was the Italian Matteo Ferrari at the end of the last race won Sunday by the Brazilian Eric Granado who had already won the race on Saturday.

© 2019 AFP