Category: Moto3

The dry weather of Friday was replaced by rain in Le Mans come Saturday morning for the fifth round of the 2019 Moto3 World Championship.

By the end of the FP3 session in the morning, the track had begun to dry, and almost the entirety of Moto3’s Q1 session was run on slick tyres. A late lap from John McPhee (Petronas SRT) took him through to Q2 as the fastest rider in Q1. The Scot was joined by Marcos Ramirez (Leopard Racing), Makar Yurchenko (BOE Skull Rider Mugen Race) and Sergio Garcia (Estrella Galicia 0,0).

It was expected that, because of the sketchy conditions, those riders who advanced through Q1 would have an advantage over the other fourteen Q2 runners in the second session.

This proved to be the case for John McPhee, who took pole position with his penultimate lap of the session. It will be important for McPhee – who has mostly disappointed in the opening four races of the season – to turn this good Saturday result into a good position in the race.

The Scot will be joined on the front row by Tony Arbolino (VNE Snipers), who has been fast all weekend, and the rookie Ai Ogura (Honda Team Asia).
Fresh from his first World Championship podium two weeks ago in Spain, Tatsuki Suzuki (Sic58 Squadra Corse) took fourth on the grid for the French Moto3 Grand Prix, with Gabriel Rodrigo (Kommerling Gresini Moto3) and Marcos Ramirez (Leopard Racing) joining him on the second row.

The Spanish Grand Prix winner, Niccolo Antonelli (Sic58 Squadra Corse) crashed for the second time this weekend at turn three which limited the Italian to seventh.

Eighth fastest in Q2 was Raul Fernandez (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team), but a penalty for irresponsible riding in FP2 will see the Spaniard start twentieth. Instead, Kaito Toba (Honda Team Asia) will start from the middle of row three. This should have put Sergio Garcia (Estrella Galicia 0,0) in ninth, but the Spanish rookie also took a twelve-place penalty and will start twenty-second. Because of this, Andrea Migno (Bester Capital Dubai) who will start from the back of the third row.

Makar Yurchenko will start Sunday’s race from tenth, with Romano Fenati (VNE Snipers) and championship leader Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team) who completes row four.

Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing) crashed at turn three on his final flying lap in Q2, and will start thirteenth, ahead of Albert Arenas (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team) and Kazuki Masaki (BOE Skull Rider Mugen Race) who also crashed in Q2; whilst Dennis Foggia (Sky Racing Team VR46), Alonso Lopez (Estrella Galicia 0,0) and Filip Salac (Redox Pruestel GP) comprise row six.

Spanish GP podium finisher Celestino Vietti (Sky Racing Team VR46) could only manage nineteenth on the grid, and will start alongside the penalised Fernandez, and Jakub Kornfeil (Redox Pruestel GP) who will be hoping for fewer motocross memes after this year’s French Moto3 Grand Prix.

The penalised Garcia will have former joint championship leader Jaume Masia (Bester Capital Dubai) and Ayumu Sasaki (Petronas SRT) alongside him on row eight; whilst behind on row nine will be Vicente Perez (Reale Avintia Arizona 77), Riccardo Rossi (Kommerling Gresini Moto3) and Can Oncu (Red Bull KTM Ajo). Tom Booth-Amos (CIP Green Power) was the slowest qualifier, but will start second-last as his teammate Darryn Binder (CIP Green Power) was also penalised twelve positions, which puts him last on Sunday’s grid.

“Inconsistent” remains the adjective of choice for the Moto3 World Championship as the 2019 season heads to Le Mans for the fifth round of the season at the French Grand Prix.

Jaume Masia (Bester Capital Dubai) looked to be making his mark on the series as he led going to Jerez, joint on points with compatriot Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team), but a crash at the end of a weekend in which he struggled for pace in Andalusia proved that this season in the lightweight class of motorcycle grand prix racing will continue to be unpredictable.

The crash for Masia, along with a fourth place for Canet, means the #44 arrives in France – a track which he won at in the Junior World Championship in 2015 but is without a podium at in the World Championship – leading the World Championship by one point. The man who is second in the championship is Niccolo Antonelli.

Antonelli was the cause of emotional scenes in Jerez, when he took the Sic58 Squadra Corse’s first victory in the World Championship, fifteen years on from Marco Simoncelli’s first GP win back in 2004 at the same track. In fact, it is possible to say that Antonelli has been the most consistent of the front-running riders this season, with a record of 8-4-5-1 in the first four races of the season and now with his first win since Qatar 2016 under his belt he will hope to be able to build on his Spanish Grand Prix result this weekend, at a circuit where Simoncelli won ten years ago by nearly twenty seconds, in the wet ahead of Hector Faubel in the 250cc class.

Whilst Antonelli will be quite content with a repeat of the result in Jerez this weekend, his teammate, Tatsuki Suzuki, will be keen to reverse the positions, having taken a debut Moto3 World Championship podium at the Spanish Grand Prix.

The third podium finisher in Jerez, Celestino Vietti (Sky Racing Team VR46) will be hoping his French Grand Prix weekend goes more in the vein of his Spanish Grand Prix weekend than in that of his CEV outings at Le Mans. In 2017, Vietti was thirtieth in the Junior World Championship race at Le Mans, while last year he DNF’d.

The reigning Moto3 Junior World Champion, Raul Fernandez (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team) has a better record than Vietti in Le Mans, and was second to Aleix Viu at the French track last season on his way to the title. He will certainly want a better result this weekend than he achieved in Spain, when he lost control of his KTM on the entry to the Dani Pedrosa Corner and cleaned out rookie Sergio Garcia (Estrella Galicia 0,0), who took fourth place at Le Mans in the 2017 CEV race.

The clouds of Saturday and Sunday morning had disappeared in time for the Moto3 race in Jerez for round four of the 2019 World Championship.

Tatsuki Suzuki (Sic58 Squadra Corse) took the holeshot from Dennis Foggia (Sky Racing Team VR46) who dropped in ahead of his teammate Celestino Vietti (Sky Racing Team VR46) whilst pole sitter Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing) made a poor start and dropped a few positions, although it did not take the #48 long to recover those positions.

Both Dalla Porta and Suzuki spent a long time at the front of the race, although in short stints, with the pair exchanging the lead between them many times throughout the race.

Initially, the group was of ten, Jakub Kornfeil (Redox PruestelGP) bringing up the rear. Eventually, Ayumu Sasaki (Petronas SRT) was dragged up to the leading group by Raul Fernandez (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team), and then the chasing pack caught the front twelve, making it a twenty-way fight for the win.

The battle was reaching boiling point, as it often does in Moto3, and eventually it boiled over. With four laps to go, Marcos Ramirez (Leopard Racing), having fought his way up from an average-at-best start to be in the fight for the lead, clipped the bike ahead of him and went down on the exit of turn four. Romano Fenati (VNE Snipers) simultaneously ran wide and into the gravel at turn five.

Then, on the same lap at turn six, Raul Fernandez lost control of his KTM in the braking zone and ended both his and Sergio Garcia’s (Estrella Galicia 0,0) races, which was unfortunate for the pair of them, but especially for Garcia, as he had no hand in the accident and had fought his way up through the pack quite strongly.

That left ten riders at the front, and Niccolo Antonelli (Sic58 Squadra Corse), having dropped as low as 13th in the mid-race, led onto the final lap from Vietti. Suzuki had come up to third by turn two, but the gap between Vietti in second and the Japanese seemed to big to overcome in one lap. However, a decent slipstream for Suzuki towards turn six, as well as a good run through turns seven and eight allowed him to make a pass on Vietti in turn nine.

This allowed Antonelli off the hook and the Italian took the his first win since Qatar 2016. It was also the first win for Paolo Simoncelli’s Sic58 Squadra Corse, who fittingly took their debut World Championship victory at the same circuit in which Tony Arbolino took their first CEV win back in 2016, and also where Marco Simoncelli won his first Grand Prix back in 2004.

In a similar way as for Petronas Yamaha in MotoGP Qualification, the day was made even better for the Italian squad, as Suzuki was able to hold off Vietti in the final corner to make it a 1-2 for the team. In many ways, Suzuki deserved to win, and would have been desperate to after his mistake cost him in Austin three weeks ago. But the Japanese has proven on two very different circuits now that he has the capabilities to fight for the win, and he will look to continue this in Le Mans.

The second podium of Celestino Vietti’s career was a hard fought one. He spent some time at the front, but mostly Vietti was fighting from third, fourth, fifth positions. He seemed to lose a bit in the mid-race, but in the closing stages was strong and managed to fight his way back to the front. Even without the move from Suzuki on the final lap, it would have been difficult for Vietti to win, because he had been quite weak in turn twelve, the penultimate corner. Nonetheless, it was a very positive result for the young Italian.

Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team) finished fourth. He had looked strong all race, but didn’t have the track position in the final stages. He was close to taking third from Vietti in the final corner, but the Italian was too far ahead, ultimately. Canet did, though, manage to come away from Jerez with a championship lead, after sharing it with Jaume Masia (Bester Capital Dubai) since Austin, and now has something to protect in Le Mans. It will be interesting to see how he manages that in two weeks time.

Albert Arenas (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team) had quite a quiet race, but made a strong result in his return from injury with fifth place, which is positive as the championship now heads to Le Mans, where last year he took his first GP win.

Kaito Toba (Honda Team Asia) had a pretty miserable weekend, but turned it around on Sunday through some strong pace, and others’ misfortune, to take sixth place, ahead of Jakub Kornfeil, Lorenzo Dalla Porta who was forced wide in turn six on the penultimate lap. Ai Ogura (Honda Team Asia) and Andrea Migno (Bester Capital Dubai) were ninth and tenth.

Dennis Foggia (Sky Racing Team VR46) had a strong pace throughout the race but a long lap penalty for track limits close to the end of the race limited him to eleventh. Darryn Binder (CIP Green Power) took twelfth, ahead of John McPhee (Petronas SRT) whose gamble on a soft rear tyre didn’t pay off; Kazuki Masaki (BOE Skull Rider Mugen Race) took fourteenth, ahead of Alonso Lopez (Estrella Galicia 0,0) who took the final point.

Whilst Aron Canet finished fourth, the man he shared the points lead with at the start of this weekend, Jaume Masia, suffered a poor weekend and ended it in the gravel, scoring no points. Tom Booth-Amos (CIP Green Power), Gabriel Rodrigo (Kommerling Gresini Moto3) also retired, whilst Filip Salac (Redox PruestelGP) retired with bike problems.

Featured Image courtesy of Gold and Goose/KTM

‘Inconsistent’ is an adjective which could be used to describe the first three races of almost every rider in the 2019 Moto3 World Championship. Although several riders have been fast in the early stages of this season, not one of them has made the podium in all three GPs of 2019.

So, despite not finishing the first race (through no fault of his own) Jaume Masia (Bester Capital Dubai) is the joint-leader of the championship, on forty-five points, going into the first European race of the season: the Spanish Grand Prix at Jerez. The speed at which the championship will now approach the halfway point, at the close of the German Grand Prix in just over two months’ time, means that consistency for the next six races is potentially the most crucial ingredient in building a championship challenge.

In Moto3, where the races are so unpredictable, hard-fought and contain so many riders and motorcycles in the battle for the lead, it is often only one rider who can identify themselves as a championship challenger. Last year, that should have been Jorge Martin, such was his speed, but his inconsistency allowed the championship to be close, with Marco Bezzecchi and Fabio Di Giannantonio remaining in touch. Perhaps the best example of the early European season being a critical point of the World Championship is 2015, when Danny Kent took so many victories, with such conviction, and made it seem impossible that anyone could challenge him in the second half of the season. Despite his awful form in the second half of the year, and Miguel Oliveira’s strong push towards the title that took the fight to the final round in Valencia, Kent’s success in motorcycle grand prix racing’s European heartlands meant he was able to clinch the crown.

It is Masia who seems closest at the moment to becoming 2019’s Danny Kent, although he will no doubt hope to avoid the drop off after the summer break. In Qatar, the Spaniard was not at full fitness, an injury sustained after setting the fastest time of the Moto3 Jerez test in the winter still holding him back. Then, he was involved in an accident not of his making. The form shown by Masia in the two following rounds, in Argentina and the United States, are perhaps more representative of his potential. A poor qualifying and a difficult start in America limited his possibilities, but nonetheless the KTM rider came through to finish second, two weeks on from picking up his first grand prix win in Argentina.

The rider who beat Masia to the flag in Austin was also the rider with whom the #5 shares the championship lead: Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team). A disappointing Argentinian round punctuated two top threes in Qatar and America for the #44, and returning to the site of his first grand prix win back in 2017, Canet will have high ambitions for this weekend in Jerez, where he will look to pull clear at the top of the championship.

The two aforementioned Spaniards are the clear standouts in the pack this season so far, as far as the championship is concerned. However, Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing) will be aiming to identify himself as a genuine championship contender as the series returns to Europe. A podium in Qatar, where he was second behind Kaito Toba (Honda Team Asia), was followed up by a seventh in Argentina and a thirteenth in America. The Argentinian result was largely due to Darryn Binder (CIP Green Power), who has not endeared himself to his competitors so far this season, and on this occasion put a move on Dalla Porta which sent him wide at turn five at the end of the straight. The Texan result, however, is not so easily explained, although the Italian’s history at the Circuit of the Americas is poor. Nonetheless, it will be a priority for the Italian to return to the podium this weekend and to close the gap on the two Spaniards who have jumped ahead of him in the standings since Qatar.

Returning to the championship this weekend, at the Circuito de Jerez – Angel Nieto, is the Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team rider, Albert Arenas, who is fit again after a nasty cycling accident which saw Aleix Viu stand in for him at the two Americas races. Two times a winner last year, Arenas is without a podium on home soil since he arrived in the World Championship, something he will be looking to change on Sunday.

Featured Image courtesy of Chippy Wood/KTM

The Moto3 races in the Circuit of the Americas are often different from the rest. The circuit is so long, technical and demanding of both rider and bike that usually over race distance a few riders will be able to distance themselves from the rest of the field.

From pole position, Niccolo Antonelli (SIC58 Squadra Corse) failed to make the holeshot, as that honour went to reigning Junior World Champion Raul Fernandez (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team). However, it was not long before the Italian was back by his Spanish rival, and trying to pull away.

Unfortunately for Antonelli, though, the slipstream in the early laps was enough to keep the pack together, and he couldn’t get away. Instead, a typical Moto3 group fight broke out, with Darryn Binder (CIP Green Power) handing out the big blows, which was not to everyone’s liking.

When Tatsuki Suzuki (SIC58 Squadra Corse) hit the front, he started to pull away. He achieved a gap of around one second, which was set on after by Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team). Suzuki had endured a tough start to the weekend; his flight was delayed, so he only arrived at the circuit on Friday morning on four hours’ sleep. When he eventually crashed, just after Andrea Migno (Bester Capital Dubai) had taken second place away from Canet, Suzuki was clearly upset, and understandably so.

That gave Migno the lead, and brought Canet closer to him – the Spaniard keen to not allow his rival any time to breathe. By this point the pair had worked themselves a gap to the duelling Hondas of Gabriel Rodrigo (Kommerling Gresini Moto3) and Alonso Lopez (Estrella Galicia 0,0), who also had a gap behind to a group of five riders which included Jaume Masia (Bester Capita Dubai), Niccolo Antonelli, Raul Fernandez and Celestino Vietti (Sky Racing Team VR46).

By the penultimate lap, Masia had closed on the two Hondas ahead, bringing the rest of his ten-wheeler with him, whilst at the same time Rodrigo and Lopez had caught Canet and Migno. This prompted Canet to make his move in turn one with two laps to go. Canet was able to fashion a small gap for himself through the first sector which meant that no one was close enough to pass him down the long back straight. Instead, it was Rodrigo who slid through on Migno for second.

Canet, at the start of the final lap, once more created that gap between himself and his pursuers which put him almost out of range on the straight. However, a strong performance from Migno on the brakes in turn eleven saw him pass Rodrigo and close to within strong slipstream range of Canet, and the Italian was through before the braking zone.

In fact, it was this which cost Migno the race. Canet was then able to switch back to the inside, and force Migno out wide, reclaiming the lead and costing the Italian time in the process, which had the #16 defending from Rodrigo in turn thirteen. Migno’s defence forced Rodrigo wide, which allowed Masia through, and the Spaniard then passed his Bester Capital Dubai teammate, Migno, in the next corner. It was not a great move, though, by the Argentina winner, and it created an unrecoverable gap to Canet, letting the #44 off the hook for his first win of the season, his first with the Max Racing Team and KTM.

It was a smart race from Canet, pushing when he needed to, but allowing others to lead the way when he was not under pressure. It was the opposite performance to the one he produced in 2017, when he dominated the weekend but crashed in the restarted race, this time he was not only fast, but also calm, and most importantly he was intelligent.

The win also moved Canet into the joint lead of the championship, sharing it with Jaume Masia, the Spanish pair each having forty-five points.

Masia’s race was a fantastic comeback. At one point he was down in sixteenth place, seemingly out of contention. However, before long he was up in the top ten, and then closing down the podium fight, which became the leading fight almost as he arrived at it. Having been taken out of the opening race of the season, winning round two and then finishing a close second at the third round are results which have identified the young Spaniard as a championship contender.

Andrea Migno ensured it was Bester Capital Dubai who occupied both lower spots on the podium, despite his best attempts to throw it away in the final corner. It was Migno’s best race since his win in Mugello back in 2017, and perhaps even better. He led the race seemingly with ease, setting a fast pace that he was comfortable with. Perhaps the move away from the VR46 squad has been just what Migno needed to re-ignite his career.

Only 0.027 seconds back of Migno was Gabriel Rodrigo, who just missed out on his first podium for Gresini, finishing fourth, less than a tenth ahead of pole sitter Niccolo Antonelli. Antonelli made a good comeback after falling back in the middle of the race to finish fifth. Tony Arbolino (VNE Snipers) who, like Masia, was way back in the pack at the beginning, but fought through, and arrived in the group with the eventual runner-up that brought him into the fight for the win, the Italian finally coming home in sixth.

Seventh place and top rookie went to Raul Fernandez, who had perhaps his most impressive performance in grand prix racing, as he stayed in the top ten for pretty much the whole race, and in the end was in the battle for the win.

Despite looking good for a podium three laps from the flag, the hard fighting that arrived in the final two laps saw Alonso Lopez shuffled back to eighth, ahead of another impressive rookie in the shape of Celestino Vietti who came home in ninth.

Tenth place went to Dennis Foggia (Sky Racing Team VR46) who cut through the pack with his teammate, Vietti, but couldn’t hold the #13’s pace. Ai Ogura (Honda Team Asia) finished eleventh, ahead of Marcos Ramirez (Leopard Racing), Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing), John McPhee (Petronas SRT) and Darryn Binder who ended up rounding out the points.

Kazuki Masaki (BOE Skull Rider Mugen Race) finished sixteenth, ahead of Vicente Perez (Reale Avintia Arizona 77), Makar Yurchenko (CIP Green Power), Sergio Garcia (Estrella Galicia 0,0), Filip Salac (Redox PruestelGP) and Riccardo Rossi (Kommerling Gresini Moto3) who was the twenty-first and final finisher.

There were a whole host of retirements, the first of which was Can Oncu (Red Bull KTM Ajo). Kaito Toba (Honda Team Asia) was the championship leader coming into this race but a crash in turn eighteen leaves him fourteen points down on Masia and Canet at the top now. Jakub Kornfeil (Redox PruestelGP) and Romano Fenati (VNE Snipers) were the next to go down, Kornfeil getting caught up in Fenati crashing in turn eighteen – the Italian crashed as he passed the Czech, leaving him nowhere to go. Tom Booth-Amos (CIP Green Power) was the next to retire, before the aforementioned Tatsuki Suzuki; then it was Aleix Viu (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team) and finally Ayumu Sasaki (Petronas SRT) retired two laps from the flag.

Featured image courtesy of Gold and Goose/KTM

It has been two weeks since the Argentinian round of the 2019 Moto3 World Championship, the second round of the series, and now the paddock heads to Texas for the Grand Prix of the Americas.

After the first two rounds of the season it is Kaito Toba (IDEMITSU Honda Team Asia) who leads the championship on an incredibly low thirty-one points. Despite winning the opening round in Qatar, Argentina did not go quite so well for the Japanese – he was caught up in the incident with John McPhee (Petronas SRT) and Alonso Lopez (Estrella Galicia 0,0) and dropped out of the leading group, so coming away with a tenth place was quite positive for the #27. The Circuit of the Americas, however, has not been a happy hunting ground for Toba in the past, and indeed he has not managed to finish a race in Austin in either of his two attempts.

Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing) has had a similar start to the season as Toba. The Italian finished second to Toba in Qatar, but was forced wide in turn five on the final lap in Argentina, finishing only seventh. Like Toba, Dalla Porta does not boast a fantastic record in COTA, and has never scored a point in Texas – something he will need to change this weekend after a low-scoring Argentina.

The third placed rider in Qatar, Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team), also had a poor showing in Termas two weeks ago, finishing in a lowly twelfth. Now lying sixth in the championship, Canet needs a result in Texas to recover some ground in the standings. Fortunately for the Spaniard, COTA has proven to be a strong circuit for him in the past, as he dominated the 2017 Grand Prix of the Americas before a crash in the restarted race cost him what would have been his maiden win.

With all of the problems for Qatar’s podium finishers in Argentina, Jaume Masia’s (Bester Capital Dubai) victory was enough to see him rocket to third in the standings despite not scoring in Losail. Like Toba and Dalla Porta, Masia has never scored a point in Texas, finishing only twenty-sixth in his debut at the track last year.

Joining Masia on the podium in Argentina were Darryn Binder (CIP Green Power) and Tony Arbolino (VNE Snipers). It was Binder’s second podium, and the first in the career of Arbolino, and both will be hoping to continue in that sort of form this weekend, on what is the most technically demanding track on the calendar.

There is only one rider in the Moto3 field who has won at Texas: Romano Fenati (VNE Snipers). The Italian won in 2016, in what was KTM’s third and latest win at the track, and then again in 2017, as he benefitted from Canet’s fall. Fenati needs a result, too. After looking very strong in preseason, the Italian has amassed just seven points from the first two races, after going 9-16 in rounds one and two.

Featured image courtesy of Gold and Goose/KTM

The first qualifying session for the Argentinian Moto3 Grand Prix got underway in overcast conditions which characterised the weekend.

From Q1, Andrea Migno (Bester Capital Dubai), Aron Canet (Sterilgarda Max Racing Team), Vicente Perez (Reale Avintia Arizona 77) and Jakub Kornfeil (PruestelGP) joined the top fourteen riders from the three free practice sessions for the Q2 pole position shootout.

Disappointed to miss out on that Q2 shootout for Moto3 would have been Can Oncu (Red Bull KTM Ajo) and Dennis Foggia (Sky Racing Team VR46), in particular, but a crash late on prevented Oncu from securing his place whilst his rivals continued to improve and Foggia took a late trip through pit lane – presumably to shake competitors from his tail – which cost him a vital slipstream on the main straight as well as through turn six, which is flat out on a Moto3 bike.

For the first five minutes of Q2, nobody left pit lane. When people did, they came straight back into the pits, not setting a time. The format of Moto3 qualifying may have changed but the games remain, and they are just as frustrating.

As frustrating as it was, the lack of activity in the first ten minutes of Moto3 Q2 meant that the final five were quite spectacular, with several riders vying for pole position in their final three or four laps.

It mostly came down to track position, and who was around. Jaume Masia (Bester Capital Dubai) almost fell foul of this, after having the final sector of his third-last lap baulked by traffic, before which he had been looking good for pole. However, the Spaniard regrouped for the next lap and set provisional pole, which two minutes later became Masia’s first pole position in Moto3. After such a difficult preseason for the Spanish youngster, with injuries which were affecting him even in Qatar three weeks ago, this result will be important for his confidence, especially for Sunday’s race where a first podium in the World Championship appears a real possibility.

Aron Canet took second place on the grid, in similar fashion to John McPhee (Petronas SRT) in Qatar who went through Q1 to qualify on the second row. Despite the speed of Masia in Q2, Canet remains a strong favourite for the win tomorrow, and will be looking to put an end to his dry run which stretches back to Silverstone 2017.

Tony Arbolino (VNE Snipers) qualified on pole position last season in Termas, so it was not a surprise to see him round out the front row of the grid, and ensure some Honda presence at the very head of the field. Despite his good record from last year on Saturday, the Italian will not be hoping for a repeat of his Sunday performance of twelve months ago, as it then saw him mistakenly fit slick tyres, which ultimately cost him any chance of a good result.

Lorenzo Dalla Porta (Leopard Racing) will be content with his fourth place ahead of Sunday’s race, and will hope to be able to back up his round one podium from there. Joining the Italian on the second row are compatriots Niccolo Antonelli (Sic58 Squadra Corse) and Andrea Migno.

A fourth consecutive Italian lines up seventh, in the shape of VNE Snipers’ Romano Fenati, who had a typically average qualifying, joining round one victor Kaito Toba (IDEMITSU Honda Team Asia) and Ayumu Sasaki (Petronas SRT) on row three.

Raul Fernandez (Sama Qatar Angel Nieto Team) impressively rounded out the top ten in qualifying on his first visit to Termas, and will be joined on the fourth row by a disappointed John McPhee and Leopard Racing’s Marcos Ramirez.

Home rider Gabriel Rodrigo (Kommerling Gresini Racing), Tatsuki Suzuki (Sic58 Squadra Corse) and Ai Ogura (IDEMITSU Honda Team Asia) will make up fifth row, whilst row six will consist of Jakub Kornfeil, Alonso Lopez (Estrella Galicia 0,0) and Vicente Perez who was the slowest of the Q2 runners in eighteenth.

 

Featured Image courtesy of Gold and Goose/KTM