There is a fight in Portimão. Enea Bastianini claimed his role as top rider, refusing to be the squire in the official Ducati Team, and took the double value pole in the Portuguese GP: he will start first in the Sprint (3:00 p.m.) and in the Sunday race, ahead of Maverick Viñales (Aprilia) and Jorge Martín (Pramac Ducati).
The leader and champion Pecco Bagnaia (Ducati) will start from the second row from the fourth painting, while the rookie Pedro Acosta will start seventh and Marc Márquez, eighth, after suffering two falls in two days.
The qualifying session to determine the starting grid among the 12 fastest in MotoGP was soon hindered by the fall of Marc Márquez, one of the favorites for pole.
The man from Cervera crashed on the first lap, when turning turn 15, when the Ducati went from behind and he lost control of the bike. He rolled on the asphalt without getting hurt and ran to catch the second bike to set time.
Meanwhile, Bagnaia, missing in the three training sessions, was in first position with a 1m37s942, the only one that was under 1m38s, ahead of Miller and Viñales.
There were six minutes left and only six of the 12 drivers had set qualifying times. Márquez took to the track with only 4 and a half minutes on the clock. He had time to complete two laps: in the first he could only be 10th, 1.2 seconds behind provisional poleman Bastianini, and in the second, with the time at zero, he was able to climb to 7th place, 0 .4 from pole. But Viñales moved him back one position, to eighth.
In the fight for pole, Martín and Bastianini attacked Bagnaia’s best time. The Madrid native took provisional pole with 2m30s remaining, and Bastianini took the privileged starting position a few seconds later with 1m37s706s. Nobody could take it away. Only Maverick Viñales, with gastroenteritis, was able to get closer to 82 thousandths and rise to second starting position for the Sprint and for the Sunday race.
“I got the fastest lap in just one attempt, I’m happy because I did a full lap and I think I can also have a good race. I hope to be able to fight for the Sprint, to be at the front, but we have many fast drivers and it will be very close,” commented Bastianini into Dazn’s microphone.
