MotoGP Portimao: Marquez dragged from Q1 to historic MotoGP pole

Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez has earned his place in the history books by securing pole position for the inaugural MotoGP Sprint Race all the way from Q1 after a magnificent last gasp surge to the top of the timesheets in qualifying for the Portuguese MotoGP.

The Spaniard began the morning on the back foot after a crash towards the end of P2 on Friday at Portimao left him outside of the top ten and therefore forced into Q1.

However, after revealing his true pace with a lap record-breaking effort just to progress from Q1, Marquez timed his best lap to perfection in Q2, making the most of a close tow from Enea Bastianini to clock a 1’37.226.

An astonishing lap from the eight-time GP World Champion, some half-a-second quicker than the erstwhile lap record set by Jack Miller on Friday, it means he will be the rider to head up the grid for MotoGP’s first-ever double-header round.

Indeed, with the addition of Saturday’s Sprint Race format - which will offer points down to ninth and run to half the distance of Sunday’s main event - making qualifying particularly critical now, Marquez’s time came after it had appeared he’d flunked his opportunity by pondering around the circuit seeking his infamous tow.

In the end though, he chose factory Ducati man Bastianini - who in turn had two bikes for reference just ahead of him - for the ‘honour’ of his shadow. It would prove a savvy move by the Repsol Honda rider, Marquez’s sizzling pace such that he was crawling over the back of the GP23 for parts of the lap.

Despite this, the close company wasn’t enough to baulk Marquez’s progress, so after getting a strong slipstream through the final corner onto the home straight, he hit the timing beam 0.073s quicker than Pecco Bagnaia.

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