Moto3 Silverstone: Martin on pole, Bezzecchi falls in post-rain dash
Full Moto3 qualifying results from Silverstone
Jorge Martin claimed a surprise seventh pole of the season in qualifying for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, overcoming his lingering injury woes and tricky weather conditions to set the lead time of 2m 13. 929s after the session had looked to be over following a shower.
The Gresini rider was aware and ready as the quick times returned to produce a perfect lap as possible to take pole position by just 0.001s as he took the chequered flag.
His main title rival, Austria race winner and current championship leader Marco Bezzecchi, had been stuck to him like glue all session and it was no surprise to see him giving chase to the Honda rider as his final flying lap commenced. The Redox PruestelGP rider was keen to keep close and rushed his shift from one side of the bike to another at the chicane, leaving him sat in the gravel, while he dropped from a front row start to eleventh.
Rookie Jaume Masia shook off any memories to his disappointing sixth in Austria after being in contention for a podium finish and looked confident in all weather on the KTM to climb to second for Bester Capital Dubai on his final lap.
Lorenzo Dalla Porta also made late progress to climb from 14th to claim the final front row slot for Leopard Racing (Honda).
Albert Arenas improved to fourth for the Angel Nieto team in the same group on track. He is joined on row two by long time leader before the rain arrived, Fabio Di Giannantonio, in fifth for Gresini and SIC Squadra Corse’s Tatsuki Suzuki in sixth.
RBA rider Gabriel Rodrigo crashed late on so was unable to prevent his slip to seventh, while Enea Bastianini, who finished second for Leopard at the Red Bull Ring, will start eighth ahead of Nicolo Bulega had a much improved qualifying in ninth for Sky Racing Team VR46.
Marcos Ramirez completed the top ten best times on the second Bester Capital Dubai entry.
The only other faller, Nico Antonelli had done enough for eleventh. The Sic Squadra Corse rider had been gaining time in the wet before putting his hand up to indicate he was slowing. He was unaware of Adam Norrodin still running on the racing line who hit him, leading to a strange fall for the almost stationary Italian.
Aron Canet and his Estrella Galicia team completely misjudged the weather and attempted a tyre change, which ended up coinciding with everyone else’s fast laps. The Spaniard could only watch from the pits as he dropped to 13th.
John McPhee (CIP-Green Power) was not far off the pace, and had a much improved session compared to his Austrian qualifying disaster, but still has work to do from 19th .
There are two British wildcard riders for the Silverstone round - Jake Archer (City Lifting RS Racing KTM) and Tom Booth-Amos (Leopard Racing Honda). Booth-Amos fared the better of the pair in 28th, while Archer starts 30th.
