Pune: Marc Marquez charged to his seventh consecutive pole in Texas while Jorge Lorenzo secured 11th place start for Repsol Honda Team.
Torrential morning rain and threats of severe lightning storms in Austin, Texas, led to the cancellation of all Free Practice 3 sessions at the Circuit of the Americas.
Fortunately conditions improved and the Repsol Honda Team were able to join the MotoGP field for Free Practice 4 as scheduled.
The FP4 session did allow riders to briefly test slicks on the drying track before heading into qualifying.
With the track more or less completely dry, Marquez continued his perfect run of form on Texan soil to secure a seventh straight pole position. His lap of 2’03.787 put Marquez over a quarter of a second clear of Rossi.
Jorge Lorenzo took full advantage of the constantly improving conditions to advance through Q1 as the fastest rider. A technical issue halted Lorenzo’s first run in Q2 but he was able to return to track with just five minutes remaining.
Despite this, Lorenzo will line up 11th on the grid with the aim of fighting inside the top ten.
LCR Honda’s Cal Crutchlow completed the front row in third place.
“The other bike had a different setting as we are trying a lot of different things so we couldn’t unlock our full potential.