Viñales Edges Out Quartararo For Netherlands Pole

Calum Gill 14:31 26/06/2021

Maverick Viñales has taken pole position for the Dutch TT, edging out teammate Fabio Quartararo for top spot.

Championship leader Quartararo had originally bettered the track record he set in 2019 by a tenth, and had put a gap of half a second between him and fellow factory Yamaha rider Viñales. However, Spaniard Viñales started his final Q2 run much earlier than most of the field, and jumped his teammate into top spot with two minutes to go.

And though Quartararo did improve on his second run, and was nearly two tenths up on Viñales after the first sector on his decisive attempt, he was ultimately forced to settle for second place on the grid for a second week running. This means that Viñales has now claimed at least one pole and one race win in each season with Yamaha since he arrived in 2017.

Francesco Bagnaia completed the front row after the Ducati rider advanced through Q1, three tenths down on Viñales' time. LCR Honda's Takaaki Nakagami will head up the second row, where he will be joined by Johann Zarco of Pramac and Miguel Oliveira, who was the only KTM representative in Q2.

A late crash at Stekkenwal didn’t prevent Álex Rins from leading Suzuki’s charge in seventh, followed by Jack Miller of Ducati and Aprilia's Aleix Espargaro. Reigning champion Joan Mir on the Suzuki was 10th, ahead of Pol Espargaro (Honda) – who followed Viñales on his pole lap but struggled to capitalise - and Valentino Rossi on his Petronas Yamaha. Rossi's teammate for the weekend - America's Garrett Gerloff - qualified last on his MotoGP debut, standing in for Franco Morbidelli.

Sachsenring winner Marc Márquez failed to get out of Q1, after he crashed in the late stages of the session. The Spaniard could only manage 20th place.

2021 Dutch TT Qualifying Classification

Q2

Q1