Ducati's Andrea Dovizioso will be starting the 2018 MotoGP Czech Grand Prix on pole tomorrow, ahead of Yamaha's Valentino Rossi and Honda rider Marc Marquez who will start in the front row. The Ducati rider managed to secure his first pole since the Malaysian GP in 2016 and managed to beat Rossi's time by 0.267s with a flying lap of 1m54.689s at Brno. Dovizioso was riding the latest-spec aero fairing on his Ducati and pushed from eighth to top spot beating Marquez. Rossi was quick to follow suit during qualifying and clocked a time one-tenth of a second faster than the reigning world champion, pushing him further down to third.
Also benefitting from the new aero-fairing, Ducati's Jorge Lorenzo will be starting fourth tomorrow, after having found his mojo back on the bike. The Spaniard registered a lead early in the qualifying sessions beating early leader Cal Crutchlow of LCR Honda, who recovered from a crash during FP3. However, Lorenzo could not improve his time and was soon beaten by Marquez, followed by Dovizioso and Rossi. The Ducati rider recorded a lap of 1m55.038s in the closing stages, while Crutchlow too failed to improve his lap time, and will be starting fifth with a gap of 0.366s over the pole-sitter.
(Valentino Rossi was just 0.267s off the pole-sitter Andrea Dovizioso)
Starting sixth will be Pramac Ducati's Danilo Petrucci, followed by Johann Zarco of Tech 3 Yamaha who posted the seventh fastest time on the circuit, ahead of Suzuki's Alex Rins and Andrea Iannone. Honda's Dani Pedrosa will be starting tenth. Completing the Q2 order, Tito Rabat of Avintia Ducati and Yamaha's Maverick Vinales will start 11th and 12th tomorrow.
With respect to crashes, Scott Redding of Aprilia crashed during FP3, while Aleix Espargaro suffered a mechanical failure. Both riders will be starting at the back of the grid.
Dovizioso takes a rare pole on a track that's been traditionally dominated by Marquez, who has three wins here. The Honda rider leads the championship, clear of 46 points and is looking strong this weekend as well. While a last minute surge did push Dovizioso to pole today, will he be able to retain the pace tomorrow as well? We are eager to find out.
