Phillip Island: Reigning world champion Marc Marquez put on a brilliant performance to recover from a crash and surged to the pole position in the qualifying stage of the Grand Prix of Australia, the next stage of MotoGP 2026, on Saturday.
Marquez took pole by a 1.494s margin, the biggest pole position margin since the 2019 Czech Grand Prix. It was vintage Marc Marquez as he came back strongly despite a Turn 4 crash. The Ducati Lenovo Team star took pole again on Saturday as the reigning World Champion sailed to a phenomenal Saturday morning P1 on a damp, tricky course at Phillip Island.
Running the #93 closest in a Q2 thriller was Alex Marquez (BK8 Gresini Racing MotoGP), and 1.503s away from Marc Marquez’s 1:34.203 in P3 was Q1 graduate Johann Zarco (Castrol Honda LCR) as World Championship leader Jorge Martin (Aprilia Racing) spearheads the second row ahead of an unmissable Tissot Sprint near Melbourne in Australia.
On a damp but drying Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit, Zarco set the initial benchmark time, leading home hero Jack Miller (Prima Pramac Yamaha MotoGP) by 0.620s. Zarco’s time was the best of the day straight out of the gate, a 1:36.557, with Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati Lenovo Team) an early P3. The gap to the Q2 promotion places was 0.6s for the Italian, though, before Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP) moved into P3, 0.4s shy of Miller’s top two effort. IANS
Also Read: Reema Malhotra backs Sushma Verma as key pick for Mumbai Indians in WPL 2027