MotoGP leader storms to pole, Aussie's top-10 run ends after rabbit ...

Jorge Martin has taken pole position for the Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix for the third year in succession, Pramac Ducati’s MotoGP world championship leader dominating qualifying at Phillip Island on Saturday morning.

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The Spaniard, who leads the standings by 10 points over reigning world champion and fellow Ducati rider Francesco Bagnaia with four rounds to play, set a lap time of 1min 27.296secs to take pole by 0.594secs from three-time Australian Grand Prix winner Marc Marquez, with Aprilia’s Maverick Vinales rounding out the front row in third place.

Ducati rider Marco Bezzecchi was fourth, while Bagnaia, who finished second to Johann Zarco in last year’s Australian Grand Prix, was fifth and over one second behind his chief title rival.

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Martin’s lap was 0.050secs slower than his all-time circuit record set in qualifying last year, as early-morning rain dissipated just before the 30-minute session and saw the riders use slick tyres for the first time all day.

“For sure today was a tricky day with this wind,” Martin said.

“It was drying quite fast so we didn’t know what to expect from the track, but when I went out I saw it was completely dry, maybe some small damp patches, and also a lot of wind.

“I was able to improve quite a lot on that second run, and I’m really happy to make another pole position here, it’s fantastic … three in a row.”

The pole was Martin’s series-leading seventh this season, but the Spaniard has failed to covert his past two Phillip Island poles to Grand Prix wins, finishing seventh in 2022 and fading to fifth last year after leading for 26 of the 27 laps.

Marquez, the most recent pole-sitter to win in Australia in 2017, took his fifth front-row start of the year, while Vinales, the 2019 Phillip Island pole-sitter, starts third for the second consecutive race weekend after Japan a fortnight ago.

Australia’s Jack Miller had the worst home qualifying of his MotoGP career with just 16th place, the KTM rider failing to emerge from Q1 after the left side of his bike was damaged from hitting a rabbit that scurried across the track.

Miller’s unfortunate encounter with the local circuit fauna snapped a run of top-10 qualifying performances on his past six visits to Phillip Island.

Saturday’s 13-lap sprint race, the first to be held in Australia after last year’s sprint was postponed 24 hours and then cancelled for bad weather, will take place at 3pm this afternoon.