Francesco Bagnaia cruised to his first MotoGP pole position of the season at Assen comfortably to continue his dominant weekend showings, with Jorge Martin and Maverick Vinales rounding off the top three.
Bagnaia’s lap time of 1.30.540s proved unstoppable as he went 0.800s quicker than his lap time from last year, with the Italian rider continuing his strong form heading into the Sprint race on Saturday afternoon.
With the factory Ducati rider sitting out in the final few minutes, Marc Marquez led the tow before consequently halting the recession of riders’ lap times. Following a change in positions on track, the following hot laps saw him enter too hot in the fast Turn 7 and almost take out a raging Aleix Espargaro in the process.
Martin finished within a tenth off pole but after impeding Trackhouse Aprilia rider Raul Fernandez he will start fifth on Sunday’s race.
Maverick Vinales and Espargaro finished third and fifth, respectively, with Gresini’s Alex Marquez sandwiched in between.
Fabio Di Giannantonio’s best lap put him in sixth as the other Marquez rider put himself in seventh.
Franco Morbidelli rounded off proceedings in eighth, with Brad Binder finishing lead KTM ahead of Pedro Acosta who suffered a tumble at the end of Q1.
Enea Bastianini and Fernandez will occupy 11th and 12th on the grid for Saturday’s Sprint.
Fabio Quartararo demonstrated Yamaha’s improvements to finish 13th, but at one point, he was inside the top two in Q1 before a bettered lap from Di Giannantonio.
Jack Miller settled for 14th on the grid but finished half a second adrift of a Q2 spot.
On the final runs of Q1 Marco Bezzecchi crashed once more, this time in Turn 5, which will put him 15th on the grid for the Sprint and Sunday race.
Alex Rins’ 16th place was all he could muster with his Yamaha bike, with the second Trackhouse rider Miguel Oliveira finishing close behind.
Aprilia test rider Lorenzo Savadori saved his best stuff for when it mattered most to put himself ahead of all Honda riders, putting his Italian machine in 18th.
LCR Honda’s Johann Zarco finished 19th as the lead Honda rider, with Repsol Honda duo Joan Mir and Luca Marini occupying 20th and 21st respectively.
Augusto Fernandez narrowly followed the duo in 22nd, but Taakaki Nakagami finished qualifying in dead last.
