MotoGP Hungarian GP: Marquez beats Acosta to sensational pole

Marc Marquez outgunned pre-qualifying favourite Pedro Acosta to claim a sensational pole position at the Hungarian Grand Prix.

While Acosta led the majority of Q2 aboard the factory KTM, reigning world champion Marquez set two rapid laps towards the end of the session to maintain his perfect qualifying record at the Balaton Park Circuit.

Fermin Aldeguer completed the front row for Gresini, while Marco Bezzecchi was Aprilia’s top runner in sixth.

At the start of the session, Acosta carried his form from Friday into qualifying, climbing to the top spot of the timesheets with a 1m37.419s before finding another two tenths on his next flying lap.

Meanwhile, Ducati suffered an early setback in Q2, with both Marquez and Fabio di Giannantonio going down at Turn 1 within seconds of each other.

However, both riders were able to remount their respective bikes and keep the engines running, with Marquez quickly moving up to second ahead of Trackhouse's Raul Fernandez.

At this stage, championship leader Bezzecchi languished in eighth place, more than half a second down on Acosta.

Pedro Acosta, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Photo by: Gold and Goose Photography / Getty Images

As the riders returned to the track in the final five minutes on fresh soft tyres, Acosta moved the goalposts with the first sub 1m37s lap of the day, putting more than half a second between him and the rest of the field.

This appeared to give the 22-year-old a decisive advantage at the front, but Marquez managed to pull something special out of the bag, posting a time of 1m36.791s to snatch the top spot.

In response, Acosta could only manage a time of 1m36.838s on his next flying lap, guaranteeing the top spot to Marquez, but the latter nevertheless improved his time to 1m36.838s to cement his grip at the front.

The result marked Marquez’s pole of the season after he topped qualifying in the Spanish Grand Prix at Jerez.

Meanwhile, Gresini sophomore Aldeguer continued his fine form at Balaton Park to book a spot on the front row behind Acosta. Di Giannantonio qualified fourth while factory rider Francesco Bagnaia came all the way from Q1 to qualify fifth, putting four Ducatis inside the top five.

Aprilia’s challenge fell flat in qualifying, with Bezzecchi ending up more than six tenths off the pace in sixth. He was closely followed by Trackhouse’s Raul Fernandez and team-mate Jorge Martin, while Honda’s Luca Marini - who came from Q1 - even outqualified the other Trackhouse bike of Ai Ogura.

The top 12 was completed by LCR rookie Diogo Moreira and Pramac’s Jack Miller.

Franco Morbidelli, VR46 Racing Team

Photo by: Ferenc Isza / AFP via Getty Images

Joan Mir set the early pace in qualifying but was knocked out of provisional Q2 spots by team-mate Marini, leaving him 13th on the grid. He will be joined on the fifth row by Tech3’s Enea Bastianini and factory Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo.

World Superbike star Iker Lecuona put his Gresini Ducati 16th on the grid on his return to MotoGP, with KTM’s Brad Binder ending up right behind him in 17th after crashing late on at Turn 12.

Toprak Razgatlioglu ended up 18th for Pramac, while Franco Morbidelli’s miserable weekend continued as the VR46 rider qualified 19th. Alex Rins (Yamaha) and Maverick Vinales (Tech3) set identical times and were qualified 20th and 21st respectively, with Johann Zarco’s injury replacement Cal Crutchlow again propping up the timesheets.

MotoGP Hungarian GP - Qualifying results

Hungarian GP - Q2 results

All Stats

 

Cla	Rider	#		Bike	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Speed Trap
1	M. Marquez Ducati Team	93		Ducati	8	1'36.785		151.573	297
2	P. Acosta Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	37		KTM	8	+0.053 1'36.838	0.053	151.490	300
3	F. Aldeguer Gresini Racing	54		Ducati	8	+0.340 1'37.125	0.287	151.042	295
4	F. Di Giannantonio Team VR46	49		Ducati	9	+0.447 1'37.232	0.107	150.876	298
5	F. Bagnaia Ducati Team	63		Ducati	8	+0.532 1'37.317	0.085	150.744	297
6	M. Bezzecchi Aprilia Racing Team	72		Aprilia	8	+0.643 1'37.428	0.111	150.572	300
7	R. Fernández Trackhouse Racing Team	25		Aprilia	9	+0.763 1'37.548	0.120	150.387	296
8	J. Martin Aprilia Racing Team	89		Aprilia	8	+0.789 1'37.574	0.026	150.347	300
9	L. Marini Honda HRC	10		Honda	8	+0.820 1'37.605	0.031	150.299	300
10	A. Ogura Trackhouse Racing Team	79		Aprilia	8	+0.844 1'37.629	0.024	150.262	300
11	D. Moreira Team LCR	11		Honda	8	+1.065 1'37.850	0.221	149.923	298
12	J. Miller Pramac Racing	43		Yamaha	8	+1.456 1'38.241	0.391	149.326	294
View full results

Hungarian GP - Q1 results

All Stats

 

Cla	Rider	#		Bike	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Speed Trap
1	F. Bagnaia Ducati Team	63		Ducati	8	1'37.443		150.549	296
2	L. Marini Honda HRC	10		Honda	8	+0.151 1'37.594	0.151	150.316	296
3	J. Mir Honda HRC	36		Honda	8	+0.313 1'37.756	0.162	150.067	297
4	E. Bastianini Tech 3	23		KTM	8	+0.372 1'37.815	0.059	149.976	300
5	F. Quartararo Yamaha Factory Racing	20		Yamaha	8	+0.522 1'37.965	0.150	149.747	291
6	I. Lecuona Gresini Racing	27		Ducati	8	+0.581 1'38.024	0.059	149.657	297
7	B. Binder Red Bull KTM Factory Racing	33		KTM	6	+0.625 1'38.068	0.044	149.590	300
8	T. Razgatlioglu Pramac Racing	7		Yamaha	8	+0.631 1'38.074	0.006	149.580	291
9	F. Morbidelli Team VR46	21		Ducati	7	+0.791 1'38.234	0.160	149.337	298
10	A. Rins Yamaha Factory Racing	42		Yamaha	8	+1.026 1'38.469	0.235	148.980	293
11	M. Viñales Tech 3	12		KTM	7	+1.026 1'38.469	0.000	148.980	295
12	C. Crutchlow Team LCR	35		Honda	8	+1.841 1'39.284	0.815	147.757	298
View full results