Enea Bastianini secured pole position in Moto3 in Assen with a time of 1m42.463. All the fast laps happened midway through the session as the top spot quickly changed hands. Spots of rain began to fall with 10 minutes to go, and though it wasn’t enough to wet the track, it was enough to cool track temperatures preventing any improvements in time.
The Sky Racing VR46 Team take up the next three positions on the grid with Andrea Migno in second, Nicolo Bulega in third and Romano Fenati heading the second row in fourth.
Championship leader Brad Binder starts from fifth, he is followed by Juanfran Guevara in sixth and Bo Bendsneyder in seventh. Fabio Quartararo will start from eighth, with Fabio DiGiannantonio in ninth and Francesco Bagnaia rounding out the top 10.
Incredibly, half a second covers the top 15 riders. Further down the grid, then, Lorenzo Dalla Porto starts from 12th. The Italian is not a regular in the championship, though his name is starting to become very familiar. This weekend he replaces Jorge Navarro, who broke his tibia and fibula in a training crash. Earlier in the year he replaced an injured Philipp Oettl, who will tomorrow start from 15th.
Niccolo Antonelli’s torrid season continues; he crashed twice in the session and will start from 13th. Worst affected by conditions, however, was rookie Aron Canet. The young Spaniard had been favourite for pole having been quickest by some distance through free practice. He had a crash early in the session which completely destroyed his bike and left him down in 32nd position. He was able to rejoin the session just as the rain started to fall, but could only improve to 16th place.
Livio Loi continues to have a disappointing season, qualifying only in 19th. John McPhee has found some pace from his Saxoprint Peugeot. He qualified in 21st but was only a second off of the pole time.
Britain’s Danny Webb makes a return to the Moto3 class. He replaces Karel Hanika who has been sacked by the Platinum Bay Real Estate Mahindra squad. Webb is still getting used to a Moto3 bike having last ridden in anger on a BMW 1000 stock bike at the fearsome Isle Of Man TT. He qualified in last place but was only 2.7 off of the fastest rider. He will remain in the championship for the remainder of the season.
