QUARTARARO SNATCHES POLE IN ARAGON
Fabio Quartararo will start from pole in Aragon. Image: LAT
MotoGP championship leader Fabio Quartararo survived a fall in free practice three to take his 10th career pole position in Aragon.
By HEATH McALPINE
Quartararo set a blistering 1m 47.076s to put his Petronas Yamaha SRT bike on pole, factory rider Maverick Vinales will line-up alongside continuing the Japanese manufacturer’s domination.
First non-Yamaha is third placed Cal Crutchlow, winning his first front-row berth since the US last year.
After a poor lead-up to qualifying Ducati were forced to contest Q1 with KTM’s Brad Binder, who crashed out on Friday.
Ducati factory rider Danilo Petrucci topped the 15-minute session ahead of Australian Jack Miller, who knocked out the Andrea Dovizioso. The furious Italian left his garage straight away and headed to the Ducati truck.
Quartararo was top of Q2 early before Miller lowered the mark to a 1m 47.657s.
The Frenchman sat in second until teammate Franco Morbidelli took second, just 0.002s short of Miller’s time.
It was Quartararo, who eclipsed Miller with the gap between the two just 0.1s after the latter also improved.
Morbidelli completed his fast lap to slot in between his teammate and the Ducati at the end of the first runs.
With new tyres, Vinales was alone on track and went 0.171s to the better of Quartararo’s mark before Crutchlow entered himself into calculations to place third and demote Morbidelli down to fourth.
Vinales then went 0.003s quicker than his own benchmark before Quartararo went 0.046s faster on his hot lap to take pole, despite losing 0.1s in the final sector.
Miller finished the session fifth, ahead of Suzuki’s Joan Mir, who completes the second row.
Takaaki Nakagami, Petrucci and Aleix Espargaro round out row three, however the latter was involved in an incident with his brother Pol, which hampered his Q2 run.
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