Martin tops Styria GP qualifying, Quartararo’s pole lap deleted

Jorge Martin claimed the second pole position of his rookie MotoGP season in a thrilling climax to Styrian Grand Prix qualifying after Fabio Quartararo had his session-topping time deleted for track limits.

Championship leader Quartararo temporarily pipped Pramac Ducati’s Martin to pole, joining him as the only rider to dip into the 1m22s, but he lost his fastest time due to a track limits infringement at Turn 9.

It allowed Martin to take his first pole since he topped qualifying at the second Qatar race earlier this year, and the first since he missed four races due to injury.

Quartararo was forced to settle for third place but he was still the only non-Ducati rider to secure a place in the top four on the grid.

Second place on the grid went the way of Ducati factory rider Francesco Bagnaia, while his team-mate Jack Miller claimed fourth place.

An FP4 crash didn’t stop Suzuki’s Joan Mir from earning his best qualifying result of the season in fifth place for Suzuki – running the ‘holeshot device’ for the first time this season.

An early FP4 setback! 👀@JoanMirOfficial slides into the gravel! 💥#StyrianGP 🏁 pic.twitter.com/pPmbwpskqd

— MotoGP™🏁 (@MotoGP) August 7, 2021

Johann Zarco, who currently sits second in the championship, couldn’t match the pace of his rookie Pramac team-mate at the Red Bull Ring, but he still claimed an important sixth place on the grid.

Aleix Espargaro claimed seventh on the grid for Aprilia ahead of Marc Marquez, who crashed in the dying moments of the session.

Eighth on the grid for @marcmarquez93! 😲

This was where his pole position challenge ended! 💢#StyrianGP 🏁 pic.twitter.com/bzEYZaHAdK

— MotoGP™🏁 (@MotoGP) August 7, 2021

Ninth place went the way of Maverick Vinales’s Yamaha and Takaaki Nakagami rounded out the top 10 on the LCR Honda.

Making it through to Q2 from Q1 was Nakagami’s team-mate Alex Marquez and the sole KTM in Q2 of Miguel Oliveira – recovering well after an FP1 shunt cost him a lot of practice running.

The second Suzuki of Alex Rins was denied a place in Q2 by just 0.033s in 13th place.

In his first MotoGP qualifying session in three years, wildcard Dani Pedrosa qualified in 14th place on his KTM test bike, ahead of Pol Espargaro who was the only Honda rider not to make it to Q2.

Brad Binder couldn’t match his KTM factory team-mate Oliveira in 16th place, just ahead of the retiring Valentino Rossi’s Petronas Yamaha.

Enea Bastianini was on course for a shock Q2 appearance before his session-topping time was deleted because of a track limits infringement.

The 23rd and slowest rider in the session was Cal Crutchlow as he continues to get up to speed on his first of three planned weekends this season, standing in for the injured Franco Morbidelli alongside Rossi.

Qualifying Results