MADRID, 29 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish rider Aleix Espargaró (Aprilia) has won pole position this Saturday for the sprint race and for the MotoGP long race of the Spanish Grand Prix, the fourth round of the Motorcycle World Championship, in a qualifying session in which Jorge Martín ( Ducati) also secured a front-row position, third.
The man from Granollers, recovered from a crash at turn 11 in the last free practice, where he also ran into a cat in the middle of the straight, set a time of 1:37.216 to sign his first pole position of the season, surpassing by something more two tenths behind Australian Jack Miller (KTM) and Martín.
Meanwhile, the Spanish Dani Pedrosa (KTM) guaranteed himself a sixth place on the starting grid, in a second row that he will share with the South African Brad Binder (KTM) and the current champion of the premier class, the Italian Francesco ‘Pecco’ Bagnaia (Ducati), both forced to go through Q1.
The rain made an appearance at the Circuito de Jerez-Ángel Nieto at the start of Q2, with most of the drivers putting on their ‘slicks’. As the water began to disappear at the beginning of the session, Aleix Espargaró rose to the top of the time table and made good use of his front rain rubber and rear slick to beat Miller and Martín.
As for the rest of the Spaniards, in addition to Pedrosa, Maverick Viñales (Aprilia) will start tenth and Álex Márquez (Ducati) will do twelfth. Among those who failed to advance to Q2, Raúl Fernández (Aprilia) will start seventeenth, just ahead of Álex Rins (Honda), Joan Mir (Repsol Honda) will do so in twentieth, Augusto Fernández (KTM) twenty-first and Iker Lecuona (Honda ), twenty-third.
The leader of the championship, the Italian Marco Bezzecchi (Ducati), will have to come back from the thirteenth place after failing to pass Q1, a batch that was also the ceiling for the Frenchman Fabio Quartararo (Yamaha), who will start the appointment sixteenth in Jerez .