MONTMELÓ, Spain —
Aleix Espargaro rode his Aprilia into
pole position for the Catalonia MotoGP after topping the times with a new track
record in Saturday's qualifying for the ninth round of the world championship.
اضافة اعلان
The Spaniard will be joined on the front row on Sunday by
Ducati's Francesco Bagnaia, who won last week in Italy, and the Yamaha of world
champion
Fabio Quartararo.
Espargaro lies eight points adrift of Quartararo in the
standings and will have high hopes of lifting his local race after emerging
fastest in second, third and fourth practice.
In the third session he blitzed to a new lap record of 1min
38.771 at the circuit outside Barcelona in scorching conditions with track
temperature hitting 55 degrees Celsius.
And then he promptly broke his own mark shortly after in
qualifying with a time of 01:38.742, to deny Bagnaia by 0.031sec.
"I did a totally crazy lap, slipping around everywhere
and in truth I didn't really appreciate this lap, I was on the limit on each
bend," said the pole-sitter.
Ducati’s dominate the second row with Prima Primac's
Johann Zarco and Jorge Martin either side of Gresini Racing's Fabio di Giannantonio.
Starting towards the rear of the grid after qualifying 21st
is Stefan Bradl called up to replace Honda's Marc Marquez.
The six-time world champion underwent surgery on his right
arm in the United States with doctors declaring on Friday the operation was a
success.
Marquez will remain in America for a few days before
returning to
Spain to continue his recovery. He is expected to miss the rest of
the 2022 season.
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