Qatar MotoGP: Marc Marquez denies Jorge Lorenzo in practice battle

Having also been quickest in second practice earlier on Friday, Honda's new signing Marquez will go into Saturday's final practice and qualifying as a sure-fire contender for pole.

Until Marquez's eleventh-hour surge to the front, most of the interest had been in the battle to secure the final top-10 places on the first weekend of MotoGP's qualifying shake-up.

MotoGP's new qualifying system explained

Under the new system, pole is decided in a 12-bike shootout known as QP2. The fastest 10 riders on combined practice times proceed straight into this session, but the rest must battle it out in QP1 for the two final places in the last segment.

Pramac Ducati duo Andrea Iannone and Ben Spies ended up being the two prototype riders left among the CRT pack in the QP1 runners.

Both had nosed into the top 10 in the closing stages only to be edged back as the likes of Nicky Hayden, Stefan Bradl and Alvaro Bautista improved just in time.

CRT star Aleix Espargaro did his best to pull off some giantkilling, but was a tenth shy of Spies.

At the front, Cal Crutchlow spent a brief period in front before fellow Yamaha rider Lorenzo turned in his 1m56.085s halfway through.

Marquez drifted as low as eighth at one stage before surging to a safe fourth.

But the Honda rider was not finished yet. As the chequered flag flew, Marquez crossed the line with a last-gasp 1m56.084s, just 0.001s ahead of Lorenzo.

He then went off the road in traffic on his slowing down lap, slithering through the gravel and continuing.

Behind Crutchlow, Valentino Rossi took fourth on the second works Yamaha, followed by Andrea Dovisioso's Ducati and the muted Dani Pedrosa's Honda.

The only notable problem was Claudio Corti pulling off with early engine problems on Forward's FTR-Kawasaki.

Pos  Rider             Team/Bike             Time       Gap
 1.  Marc Marquez      Honda                 1m56.084s
 2.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha                1m56.085s  + 0.001s
 3.  Cal Crutchlow     Tech 3 Yamaha         1m56.326s  + 0.242s
 4.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha                1m56.416s  + 0.332s
 5.  Andrea Dovizioso  Ducati                1m56.417s  + 0.333s
 6.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda                 1m56.502s  + 0.418s
 7.  Alvaro Bautista   Gresini Honda         1m56.572s  + 0.488s
 8.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati                1m56.670s  + 0.586s
 9.  Bradley Smith     Tech 3 Yamaha         1m56.901s  + 0.817s
10.  Stefan Bradl      LCR Honda             1m56.984s  + 0.900s
11.  Andrea Iannone    Pramac Ducati         1m57.169s  + 1.085s
12.  Ben Spies         Pramac Ducati         1m57.308s  + 1.224s
13.  Aleix Espargaro   Aspar Aprilia         1m57.420s  + 1.336s
14.  Hector Barbera    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  1m57.956s  + 1.872s
15.  Yonny Hernandez   PBM Aprilia           1m58.211s  + 2.127s
16.  Randy de Puniet   Aspar Aprilia         1m58.396s  + 2.312s
17.  Colin Edwards     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  1m58.863s  + 2.779s
18.  Karel Abraham     Cardion Aprilia       1m59.180s  + 3.096s
19.  Hiroshi Aoyama    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  1m59.212s  + 3.128s
20.  Danilo Petrucci   Ioda-Suter-BMW        1m59.755s  + 3.671s
21.  Bryan Staring     Gresini FTR-Honda     1m59.758s  + 3.674s
22.  Lukas Pesek       Ioda-Suter-BMW        1m59.837s  + 3.753s
23.  Michael Laverty   PBM-Aprilia           2m00.080s  + 3.996s
24.  Claudio Corti     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  2m00.439s  + 4.355s