2018 Buriram Moto2 Qualifying Result: A Crowded Three Hundredths Of A Second

Submitted by Zara Daniela on Sat, 2018-10-06 09:11

The final battle of the day was the usual smouldering fire but this time set in the humid heat of Thailand. Lorenzo Baldassarri’s second flying lap set him up at the top of the timesheets and challengers were few throughout the remaining 40 minutes. One of the most significant was Alex Marquez, the Spaniard enjoying an eventful session which started off with a grassy excursion, continued with a cancelled fastest time and ended two hundredths of a second off pole. The achievement stayed with Baldassarri for only the second time in the Italian’s career, as he snatched the first Moto2 pole position in Buriram.

Marquez just about missed out on pole but separated an all Italian lineup with Luca Marini and Mattia Pasini, demoting the Italtrans rider to row two. That left the front row separated by a mere three hundredths of a second. Pasini turned his consistent speed throughout the weekend into a second row start, a tenth slower than Marini and rueing a late fall. The title fight resumes from second row on the grid as well, Miguel Oliveira showing the way to Pecco Bagnaia in fifth and sixth positions.

Brad Binder made some late progress into seventh, sharing row three with a somewhat disappointed Fabio Quartararo and a speedy Augusto Fernandez. Marcel Schrotter in tenth grid spot was barely three tenths off pole, with 20 riders lapping within a second of Baldassarri. This included Joan Mir on row four, Sam Lowes on row five and Jorge Navarro another row back.

Results:

Pos.	Num.	Rider	Bike	Time	Gap 1st	Prev.
1	7	Lorenzo BALDASSARRI	Kalex	1'36.374
2	73	Alex MARQUEZ	Kalex	1'36.400	0.026	0.026
3	10	Luca MARINI	Kalex	1'36.408	0.034	0.008
4	54	Mattia PASINI	Kalex	1'36.527	0.153	0.119
5	44	Miguel OLIVEIRA	KTM	1'36.529	0.155	0.002
6	42	Francesco BAGNAIA	Kalex	1'36.531	0.157	0.002
7	41	Brad BINDER	KTM	1'36.545	0.171	0.014
8	20	Fabio QUARTARARO	Speed Up	1'36.589	0.215	0.044
9	40	Augusto FERNANDEZ	Kalex	1'36.661	0.287	0.072
10	23	Marcel SCHROTTER	Kalex	1'36.689	0.315	0.028
11	36	Joan MIR	Kalex	1'36.744	0.370	0.055
12	27	Iker LECUONA	KTM	1'36.797	0.423	0.053
13	24	Simone CORSI	Kalex	1'36.865	0.491	0.068
14	77	Dominique AEGERTER	KTM	1'36.867	0.493	0.002
15	22	Sam LOWES	KTM	1'36.877	0.503	0.010
16	5	Andrea LOCATELLI	Kalex	1'36.878	0.504	0.001
17	9	Jorge NAVARRO	Kalex	1'36.894	0.520	0.016
18	45	Tetsuta NAGASHIMA	Kalex	1'36.898	0.524	0.004
19	87	Remy GARDNER	Tech 3	1'36.933	0.559	0.035
20	97	Xavi VIERGE	Kalex	1'37.069	0.695	0.136
21	4	Steven ODENDAAL	NTS	1'37.287	0.913	0.218
22	16	Joe ROBERTS	NTS	1'37.432	1.058	0.145
23	64	Bo BENDSNEYDER	Tech 3	1'37.474	1.100	0.042
24	89	Khairul Idham PAWI	Kalex	1'37.537	1.163	0.063
25	57	Edgar PONS	Speed Up	1'37.588	1.214	0.051
26	99	Thitipong WAROKORN	Kalex	1'37.673	1.299	0.085
27	62	Stefano MANZI	Suter	1'37.686	1.312	0.013
28	66	Niki TUULI	Kalex	1'37.722	1.348	0.036
29	18	Xavi CARDELUS	Kalex	1'37.997	1.623	0.275
30	95	Jules DANILO	Kalex	1'38.260	1.886	0.263
31	32	Isaac VIÑALES	Suter	1'38.622	2.248	0.362
32	21	Federico FULIGNI	Kalex	1'38.772	2.398	0.150