Andrea Dovizioso aims at another victory after the one he gained back in 2017. Johann Zarco and Jack Miller will be next to him on the front row, while Marc Marquez is 6th.
The 1st on Friday, leading FP3, Andrea Dovizioso keeps on showing us his great shape and gets the 20th pole position in his career, the 7th in the MotoGP World Championship. He definitely has some great cards to play against Marc Marquez, especially since the current World Champion didn’t get more than a 6th place. On the front row with Dovizioso there will be Johann Zarco, the best Yamaha rider on the starting grid, and Jack Miller, who registered an amazing lap time just before he slipped (luckily with no injuries).
We had an exciting second round of Qualifying today, as all riders fought hard until the very end to get, if not the pole, at least a good position on the starting grid. But the end result was nonetheless really unexpected. Andrea Dovizioso won the pole with an amazing performance, but at the same time, there will be neither Honda nor official Yamaha on the front row. Instead, we’ll see Johann Zarco and Jack Miller (who fell just before the chequered flag) kicking off next to Dovizioso.
Cal Crutchlow closed Qualifying 4th ahead of Andrea Iannone and the current World Championship leader Marc Marquez. Maverick Viñales will start from the 3rd row together with Alex Rins and Valentino Rossi. Alvaro Bautista, Dani Pedrosa and Takaaki Nakagami took up the remaining positions in the top 12.
The battle in Q1 immediately fired up, in particular among the riders just outside the top 10 who were determined to get the last two available positions in order to dispute the second round of Qualifying. Among others, Franco Morbidelli was really trying hard but he had to give up after falling on Turn 12. Access to Q2 seemed sure for Takaaki Nakagami and Bradley Smith, but Alvaro Bautista made an incredibly fast lap that took him on top, leaving the KTM rider back in the 3rd place.
Q2 ranking
The starting grid
