2025 British MotoGP: Fabio Quartararo maintains pole streak, Marc Marquez off front row
Fabio Quartararo on pole for British MotoGP with new lap record
Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo completed a hat-trick of MotoGP poles in in 2025 after topping qualifying for the British Grand Prix, while Marc Marquez was fourth.
Fabio Quartararo has put his factory Yamaha on pole at the Spanish and French Grands Prix, and continued that streak at Silverstone on Saturday afternoon.
The 2021 world champion set a new lap record of 1m57.233s to dominate Q2 by 0.309s, which marks his first hat-trick of poles since the 2021 season.
Quartararo heads Alex Marquez - who crashed heavily in FP2 - while Pecco Bagnaia returned to the front row for the first time since the Spanish GP.
Marc Marquez qualified fourth on the sister factory team Ducati, which is his worst grid position of the season and his first off the front row.
Yamaha has been in strong form all weekend so far and Alex Rins continued that at the start of the 15-minute Q2 as he set the benchmark at 1m58.558s while following the Marquez brothers.
He was quickly deposed by team-mate Quartararo, who posted a 1m58.506s, before Marc Marquez dipped into the 1m57s with a 1m57.914s.
At the end of the first runs, Quartararo held second, 0.281s behind Marc Marquez.
With just under two minutes to go in the session, Bagnaia - who felt he made a breakthrough on the front end of his Ducati on Friday - went top with a 1m57.822s.
His time on pole was short-lived, as Alex Marquez found a 1m57.542s with a minute to go to put his Gresini Ducati top of the timesheets.
But this wouldn’t be enough to deny Quartararo, whose 1m57.233s put him 0.309s clear of the field.
Marc Marquez was on course to challenge Quartararo’s time on his final lap, but he made a mistake on his way into Copse and then aborted the lap going through Maggotts.
The championship leader will start this weekend’s races from fourth ahead of Gresini rookie Fermin Aldeguer and Pramac Yamaha’s Jack Miller - some 0.872s off Quartararo.
Fabio Di Giannantonio was seventh on his VR46 Ducati ahead of Honda’s Luca Marini and his LCR counterpart Johann Zarco, who crashed at the end of the session.
Franco Morbidelli came through Q1 with Marini but could only manage 10th on the sister VR46 Ducati. He will drop three places on the grid on Sunday for impeding in Practice.
Marco Bezzecchi was the leading Aprilia in 11th, with Rins dropping to 12th at the chequered flag.
Joan Mir narrowly missing out on a Q2 place in 13th on his factory Honda, while Pedro Acosta was the top KTM in 14th.
LCR’s Somkiat Chantra crashed in Q1, while Tech3 KTM’s Maverick Vinales suffered a technical issue, which left him 18th.
