Watch Alex Marquez's dramatic save: 'On the bike, not so fun!'

Alex Marquez has recounted his dramatic save, joking that it “wasn’t so fun” to experience first-hand and expressing relief at not incurring injury during a crucial stage of his world championship bid.

The Moto2 title leader was chasing a fast lap time during FP3, held in sodden conditions, when he high-sided his Marc VDS Kalex machine on the exit of the final corner.

What happened next was the stuff of legend; despite being flicked off the bike, the 23-year old somehow managed to maintain hold of both handlebars as he came down on his knees to the left of his machine.

Having regained his balance, he then cruised along the start finish straight to stop and remount, a time during which he saw the applause and laughter of his team on pit wall.

“I had a big moment,” Marquez later said. “On the bike it wasn’t so fun! Then when I was on the side of the bike I said, ‘OK, I’ve saved it!’ I then passed in front of the box and saw Guille [Carrillo – mechanic] and all of the team laughing a lot and was happy to save it and lucky to escape injury.

“It was a really good save. It looked good on TV, especially in slow motion, from the front and the side. I’m really happy for that!”

The save was reminiscent of Randy Mamola’s legendary effort at Misano, 1985 while racing Rothman’s Honda’s NSR500. And while different in style, it was clear Alex had learned a thing or two from older brother Marc, who is not adverse to remaining upright after a position of peril.

“They always say the younger brother will be better than the older one,” joked MotoGP pole sitter Marc in the qualifying press conference.

“[It was] Impressive, because the save you can only do when you are extra concentrated and he is in a very important moment in the championship so he is fully concentrated so he wants to do it.

“I am happy. He was very lucky – not for the save but because they recorded it in a very good way with the slow motion. He will have this video for all his career.”

All in all, it was a positive day for Alex Marquez, who qualified in a strong fourth place for Sunday’s Moto2 event. Sitting 40 points clear of nearest challenger Augusto Fernandez, the former Moto3 world champion has his eyes on a tenth podium finish of the year.

“I’m so happy because it was such a difficult day,” he said. “In qualifying especially because the conditions were really tricky. We suffered a little bit but we did quite well. The objective was to be on the first three rows.

“We will start from the second one so the objective was done. For tomorrow will be a new day. We’ll take all the information from Friday, try to make a step and feel better.

“Tomorrow we need to be intelligent, make our own race and get a good result. The podium is the target and we’ll try to achieve that.”