Jorge Martin notched up his eighth pole of 2017 after topping a rain-interrupted Australian Grand Prix Moto3 qualifying, while championship leader Joan Mir completed the front row.
Marinelli Snipers’ Romano Fenati latched onto the back of championship rival Joan Mir for the opening minutes of the session, and utilised the tow from the Leopard rider to set the early benchmark of 1m38.270s.
RBA Racing’s Juanfran Guevara quickly took over from the Italian, though, with Guevara using his team–mate Gabriel Rodrigo to slingshot across the line with a 1m37.544s.
Fenati and standings leader Mir – who are split by 55 points ahead of Sunday’s race – continued to shadow each other, and exchanged blows on several occasions, but were unable to put provisional pole under threat.
With 15 minutes to go, Jorge Martin laid down the gauntlet with a 1m31.030s set without the benefit of a tow and on the harder rear tyre, and held onto to top spot as a late sprinkling of rain denied anyone the chance to topple the Gresini rider.
Rodrigo will start from second ahead of Mir, while Guevara capped off a strong afternoon for the RBA team at the head of the second row. Fenati rounded out the top five ahead of team–mate Jules Danilo.
CIP Mahindra’s Manuel Pagliani secured his best qualifying result of the year in seventh, with Aron Canet, Enea Bastianini and Tatsuki Suzuki completing the top 10 ahead of Fabio Di Giannatonio and the secind CIP bike of Motegi podium finisher Marco Bezzecchi.
Philipp Oettl, Lorenzo Dalla Porta and Niccolo Antonelli rounded out the top 15, while the late rain fall left the likes of Bo Bendsneyder, Motegi pole man Nicolo Bulega, John McPhee – who is fighting for his future in the Moto3 World Championship – and Andrea Migno stranded in 19th, 23th, 25th and 26th respectively.
Aspar stand–in Maria Herrera qualified 27th for her first race since Aragon, while Australian wildcard Tom Toparis completed the 31–rider field.
