Marquez was three-tenths of a second quicker than the Ducati of Andrea Iannone, who set exactly the same time – to the thousandth of a second – as Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo.

Marquez suffered a big scare when he almost fell on his second run, and visibly winced with his injured left hand due to the kickback through the handlebars. But he bounced back to extend his advantage on his penultimate lap of the session, earning his eighth pole of the season and the 30th of his MotoGP career… in only his third season.

Lorenzo’s title rival Valentino Rossi could only manage seventh on the grid for the inside of the third row.

Story of the session

Lorenzo was due to set the first flying lap, but lifted out of it when he realized Yamaha teammate Rossi tried to repeat his recent trick of tailing him to gain a tow.

That meant Marquez set the opening marker of 1m28.731s, with Lorenzo responding with 1m29.034s, 0.3s down after losing time in the final sector where Marquez has been imperious this weekend.

Aleix Espargaro popped into second on 1m29.015s, the Suzuki able to use the softer rear tyre along with the Ducatis. Rossi was P7 after the first run, 0.504s off Marquez’s pace.

On the first lap of his second run, Marquez had a huge moment – very nearly hitting the deck. He headed straight for the pits to return to his first bike. Then Iannone jumped up to second on 1m28.821s, just 0.09s off Marquez’s pole time.

Lorenzo improved to P3 on 1m28.839s, but a tell-take shake of the head showed he was less than ecstatic about the time.

Marquez lowered the bar on his third run to 1m28.364s, extending his advantage to almost half a second.

“With the third tyre, we did a good lap,” said Marquez. “[But] I’m sure Jorge will make a step [in the race] because he knows he has to win this race to fight for the title.”

Dani Pedrosa then rocketed to second to make it a Honda 1-2 on 1m28.712s, which temporarily pushed Lorenzo off the front row. Then Lorenzo improved to 1m28.680s, to snatch back his place on the front row only to discover Iannone had matched his time – to the thousandth – and earn the P2 spot.

Lorenzo anger

Lorenzo was quick to show his anger that Iannone had deliberately towed him, and Iannone admitted he would never have got onto the front row without the tow.

“I did my best,” shrugged Lorenzo. “Position three is OK knowing that Valentino is seventh.”

Pedrosa ended the session fourth, ahead of Cal Crutchlow’s LCR Honda and the Suzuki of Maverick Vinales. 

The Espargaro brothers progressed to Q2 from Q1, having lapped within 0.05s of each other with Pol just shading Aleix. They will start eighth and ninth, with Aleix eventually gaining the upper hand by two-tenths in Q2.

Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso, Scott Redding and Bradley Smith – who struggled after suffering a heavy fall in FP4 earlier this morning – rounded out the top 12.

Pos	Rider	Bike	Time
1	Marc Marquez	Honda RC213V	1:28.364
2	Andrea Iannone	Ducati GP15	1:28.680
3	Jorge Lorenzo	Yamaha YZR-M1	1:28.680
4	Dani Pedrosa	Honda RC213V	1:28.712
5	Cal Crutchlow	Honda RC213V	1:28.912
6	Maverick Viñales	Suzuki GSX-RR	1:28.932
7	Valentino Rossi	Yamaha YZR-M1	1:29.014
8	Aleix Espargaro	Suzuki GSX-RR	1:29.015
9	Pol Espargaro	Yamaha YZR-M1	1:29.222
10	Andrea Dovizioso	Ducati GP15	1:29.267
11	Scott Redding	Honda RC213V	1:29.499
12	Bradley Smith	Yamaha YZR-M1	1:29.626
13	Danilo Petrucci	Ducati GP14	1:29.918
14	Hector Barbera	Ducati GP14	1:30.064
15	Jack Miller	Honda	1:30.104
16	Eugene Laverty	Honda RC213V-RS	1:30.105
17	Yonny Hernandez	Ducati GP14	1:30.135
18	Alvaro Bautista	Aprilia RS-GP	1:30.147
19	Loris Baz	Yamaha Forward	1:30.173
20	Nicky Hayden	Honda RC213V-RS	1:30.376
21	Stefan Bradl	Aprilia RS-GP	1:30.634
22	Mike di Meglio	Ducati GP14	1:30.959
23	Anthony West	Honda RC213V-RS	1:31.205
24	Toni Elias	Yamaha Forward	1:31.837
25	Damian Cudlin	ART	1:33.884