Pole position (with a final crash) for Mattia Pasini at Phillip Island, ahead of Marcel Schrötter and Xavi Vierge, while Bagnaia and Oliveira remained far behind.
Mattia Pasini won the pole position and he will start the Australian GP from the top of the starting grid. He definitely wants to live it from the leading character’s point of view. Next to him on the front row tomorrow there will be Marcel Schrötter and Xavi Vierge, while both Francesco Bagnaia and Miguel Oliveira remained surprisingly far back in the ranking, even outside the top 10.
The first few minutes of this qualifying were particularly intense, with some crashes too: in particular, that of Fuligni, soon followed by Marquez, who fell down after hitting Odendaal and had to leave qualifying early. Tuuli couldn’t take part in this round because he had to go to the hospital to have his back checked up after his violent fall during FP3. In the meanwhile on track, Pasini immediately took the lead ahead of Vierge and Aegerter. But the crashes didn’t stop there: Manzi (he seemed to be in a lot of pain and had to be taken out on a gurney), Lecuona, Nagashima, and Locatelli all slipped too.
Mattia Pasini didn’t miss his chance to fall during the last few minutes either, but the Italian rider had already registered the best time of qualifying and got the pole position anyway. On the front row there will be the two Dynavolt riders too, Marcel Schrötter and Xavi Vierge. Dominique Aegerter (who also fell at the end of the round) got the 4th place, followed by Brad Binder and Fabio Quartararo. Luca Marini got the 7th place on the starting grid, ahead of Iker Lecuona, Alex Marquez and Jesko Raffin. Noticeably absent from the top 10 are the two main rivals for the World Championship title: Francesco Bagnaia is only 16th, and Miguel Oliveira 20th.
The ranking
