MOTO GP – Italian GP – Qualifying

Tough times are coming on the Moto GP calendar, as the teams would face a four GPs on a 5-week time lapse. With this weekend Italian GP at Autódromo Internacional del Mugello. A track that has been Ducati friendly over the last few years.

First Q1 session started a bit late after a scary crash on Moto 3 Q2, as a rider had to be taken to the hospital via Helicopter. Hoping he can recover completely from that incident. First session saw Aleix, Marc Marquez, Viñales and Nakagami as main conteders for a spot on Q2. With the first stint saw Nakagami and Bastianini leading the standings. But then, a particular story was developing, as Marc Marquez was sticking to Viñales bike on the whole second stint, even following him on the pit lane, as both bike get their penultimate attempt, Viñales crossed as 3rd fastest and Marquez got a place on the Q2, alongside a inspired Aleix Espargaro who´s still having a great momentum with the Aprilia bike. Maverick fall on the mind games of Marquez and now he´ll need a comeback at raceday.

Q1 results:

13. Maverick Viñales /// 14. Enea Bastianini /// 15. Takaaki Nakagami
16. Michele Pirro /// 17. Luca Marini /// 18. Danilo Petrucci
19. Valentino Rossi ///20. Iker Lecuona ///21. Lorenzo Savadori
22. Alex Marquez

Second Qualy session was underway, as Bagnaia, Miller and Zarco wanted to get pole on home soil, but they got a big obstacle ahead to overcome, as Fabio Quartararo wanted to continue his pole streak that has from the previous three GPs. On the fist stint, it was the frenchman on the Yamaha who was leading the group, followed by Aleix Espargaro, Francesco Bagnaia and Jack Miller. Another thing that could be remark, is that both KTM were showing a great improvement compared to the last qualy sessions, getting strong times between the first provisional two rows. Fabio Quartararo was flying on track and demolished the track record by almost 3 tenths, not even the Ducatis on the straights were strong enough to be close to him. At the end, Bagnaia and Zarco closed the front row; With a strong 4th place for Aleix Espargaro, Jack Miller on 5th and Brad Binder closes the 2nd row.

Q2 Results:

1. Fabio Quartararo /// 2. Francesco Bagnaia /// 3. Johann Zarco
4. Aleix Espargaro /// 5. Jack Miller /// 6. Brad Binder
7. Miguel Oliveira /// 8. Alex Rins /// 9. Joan Mir
10. Franco Morbidelli /// 11. Marc Marquez /// 12. Pol Espargaro

Quartararo gets his 14th career pole and its 4th in a row, showing that Yamaha has a strong bike and rider combination overall. Although the frenchman had issues on the last two races before, it is evident that the team can create a gap against the competition if the can start getting those wins on sunday; Reliabiluty has been a strong issue on Yamaha. It has been benefical for Ducati over the last few races, as they found unexpected way to grab huge points at the championship. Can they keep up doing that, or Yamaha starts to close good weekends?