MotoGP’s championship leader Jorge Martin claimed pole position in a thrilling qualifying at the Japanese Grand Prix, beating Marc Marquez to the top spot by a tenth of a second.
Martin had been the slower of the two factory Aprilia riders for much of the weekend, but he upped the pace in Q2, lowering the circuit record to 1m42.371s to secure his third pole position of the season and second in consecutive weekends.
Marquez failed to improve his lap time on his second run and ended up second on the factory Ducati, while Austrian GP winner Pedro Acosta secured the final spot on the front row.
At the start of Q2, Friday pacesetter Alex Marquez set the initial benchmark on the Gresini Ducati, lapping Motegi in 1m42.878s on his first flying lap.
But his elder brother Marc Marquez immediately moved the goalposts, clocking a time of 1m42.481s to smash the circuit record and put four tenths between him and the rest of the field.
Alex Marquez tried to respond on his next flyer but ended up a tenth short of Marc, leaving the factory Ducati on provisional pole after the first runs.
As the riders returned on track in the final five minutes, the Aprilias put up a sterner challenge against the Ducati-mounted Marquez brothers, leaving qualifying wide open.
Raul Fernandez first jumped from 12th to third for Trackhouse, before Martin shot to the top on the factory Aprilia with a 1m42.371s, edging out Marc Marquez by a tenth of a second.
The reigning world champion made a mistake on his next attempt and ran wide at Turn 3, but gave one final push as the clock ticked down to zero. While he was faster than Martin through the first two sectors, his lap time eventually fell away, leaving him second on the grid for the two races at Motegi.
Acosta put on a strong performance aboard the factory KTM, rising to third at the end of the session with a time that was just 0.122s down on polesitter Martin.
Marco Bezzecchi had to settle for fourth on the other factory Aprilia, with Alex Marquez dropping to fifth in the final order aboard his Gresini Ducati.
Fabio di Giannantonio was next up in sixth for VR46, just ahead of the lead Tech3 KTM of Enea Bastianini.
Meanwhile, Trackhouse duo Raul Fernandez and Ai Ogura made their way from Q1 to qualify eighth and 11th respectively at Motegi. Ogura, racing on home turf, was restricted to a single bike in qualifying after recording his second crash of the weekend in FP2 earlier this morning.
The Trackhouse duo were separated by the LCRs of Diogo Moreira and Johann Zarco, the latter holding on to 10th despite crashing at Turn 9.
Fabio Quartararo rounded out the top 12 for Yamaha.
Factory Ducati rider Francesco Bagnaia was denied a Q2 spot at the last minute by Fernandez, ending up 13th on the grid on a track where he broke the lap record last year.
The two other Ducati riders who appeared in Q1 were also unable to progress to the second leg of qualifying, with Franco Morbidelli finishing 14th for VR46 and Gresini’s Fermin Aldeguer only managing 18th.
Meanwhile, Somkiat Chantra starred on his return to MotoGP as a substitute for Joan Mir, beating his Honda team-mate Luca Marini to 15th place.
KTM’s Brad Binder qualified 17th behind Marini after crashing late on at Turn 12, while his Tech3 counterpart Maverick Vinales was 19th on his comeback from injuries.
The field was propped up by the Yamahas of Jack Miller, Alex Rins and Toprak Razgatlioglu.
| 1 | 89 |  |
Aprilia | 8 | 168.832 | |||
| 2 | 93 |  |
Ducati | 7 | 0.110 | 168.651 | ||
| 3 | 37 |  |
KTM | 8 | 0.012 | 168.632 | ||
| 4 | 72 | |
Aprilia | 8 | 0.037 | 168.571 | ||
| 5 | 73 |  |
Ducati | 8 | 0.016 | 168.544 | ||
| 6 | 49 |  |
Ducati | 8 | 0.082 | 168.410 | ||
| 7 | 23 |  |
KTM | 8 | 0.041 | 168.342 | ||
| 8 | 25 |  |
Aprilia | 8 | 0.072 | 168.224 | ||
| 9 | 11 |  |
Honda | 7 | 0.175 | 167.938 | ||
| 10 | 5 |  |
Honda | 6 | 0.002 | 167.935 | ||
| 11 | 79 |  |
Aprilia | 4 | 0.015 | 167.911 | ||
| 12 | 20 |  |
Yamaha | 8 | 0.126 | 167.705 |
| 1 | 79 |  |
Aprilia | 5 | 167.992 | |||
| 2 | 25 |  |
Aprilia | 7 | 0.001 | 167.991 | ||
| 3 | 63 | |
Ducati | 7 | 0.123 | 167.790 | ||
| 4 | 21 |  |
Ducati | 8 | 0.129 | 167.580 | ||
| 5 | 15 |  |
Honda | 8 | 0.060 | 167.483 | ||
| 6 | 10 |  |
Honda | 8 | 0.082 | 167.350 | ||
| 7 | 33 |  |
KTM | 4 | 0.121 | 167.154 | ||
| 8 | 54 |  |
Ducati | 7 | 0.020 | 167.122 | ||
| 9 | 12 |  |
KTM | 7 | 0.186 | 166.822 | ||
| 10 | 43 |  |
Yamaha | 6 | 0.206 | 166.491 | ||
| 11 | 42 |  |
Yamaha | 8 | 0.085 | 166.354 | ||
| 12 | 7 |  |
Yamaha | 7 | 0.135 | 166.138 |
