The drama unfolded in the dying seconds of qualifying for the British Grand Prix as Aprilia’s Aleix Espargaro snatched pole position from the clutches of the Ducati duo.
With time running out, Espargaro delivered a stunning lap of 1:57.309s, capitalizing on late setbacks for the favored Francesco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini to claim the top spot on the grid.
This sets Espargaro up for a potential repeat of his 2023 Silverstone victory. Jorge Martin secured fourth on the Pramac Ducati, while a frustrated Marc Marquez languished in seventh on his year-old Gresini machine.
Aleix Espargaro stunned the Ducati contingent to secure his first pole position of the season. His Aprilia topped the timesheets by two-tenths of a second over Francesco Bagnaia, who could not capitalize on his late qualifying run.
Enea Bastianini and Jorge Martin completed the front row for Ducati, but they were also unable to improve on their earlier efforts. Alex Marquez was impressed with the Gresini Ducati, securing fifth ahead of the KTM duo, Brad Binder and Marc Marquez.
Maverick Vinales’s late crash relegated him to eighth, while Pedro Acosta, who progressed from Q1, claimed ninth. The VR46 duo of Fabio di Giannantonio and Marco Bezzecchi underperformed, finishing tenth and twelfth respectively, split by Jack Miller’s KTM.
Pramac’s Franco Morbidelli led a tight group of riders in the thirteenth, followed by Raul Fernandez and Miguel Oliveira. Johann Zarco was the top Honda in the fifteenth, with Fabio Quartararo as the leading Yamaha rider in the seventeenth. Remy Gardner, substituting for the injured Alex Rins, brought up the rear in the twenty-second.
