Marquez drops out of German GP after breaking thumb in warm-up

"Marc Marquez withdraws from German GP." tweeted the Honda team an hour before the race saying "Marquez has elected to miss the German Grand Prix after suffering a crash at Turn 7 during morning warm up."

The Spaniard, who went over the handlebars of his Honda at full speed shortly before 10am, appeared to be completely stunned. He took several minutes to recover before limping away and heading back to the pits.

Marquez missed three races earlier this season after undergoing hand surgery following a spill in the season-opener in Portugal. It was his fifth operation since crashing in Jerez in 2020.

On Sunday morning, the Spaniard initially said he wanted to race.

The six-time world champion "has a very small fracture in the first finger of his left hand. He has been declared FIT," declared MotoGP on its social networks before Marquez changed his mind.

Marquez had been enduring a nightmare weekend, with no less than five crashes.

He was due to start seventh on the grid for the GP, which gets underway at 2pm.

On Saturday, he finished 11th in the sprint race, the first time he has failed to win in 12 starts at the Sachsenring, explaining that he had "taken a calmer approach" than during qualifying, when he crashed three times.

"The priority was to avoid another crash," he said.