Moto3 Q2 in Brno: Third pole in a row for Almansa, Quiles’ bike let him down

In sweltering heat, the battle for the best starting positions for the Moto3 race took place at the Brno Autodrom. 14 plus 4 – that was the familiar formula at the Czech GP too. Four more youngsters joined the top 14, who had already secured their places on Friday afternoon, via the Q1 session. Among them was the Austrian Leo Rammerstorfer. The rookie from the Italian SIC58 team initially held P2 there, but in the final session, rider number 5 dropped back to 23rd on the grid.

Also through to Q2 was Marcos Uriarte, standing in for the injured David Munoz at Intact GP. The Spaniard had set the fastest time in Q1. Also present were Rammerstorfer’s team-mate Casey O’Gorman, Eddie O’Shea and Adrian Fernandez, who had recently made headlines because his Leopard team had sent him out onto the track with tampered engines.

Q2 was barely two minutes old when Jesus Rios lost control of his Honda at Turn 5. In the early stages, the yellow flags had no impact. Things got underway with an announcement from Hakim Danish. Heat-hardened Malaysia set the first benchmark with a time of 2:04.490 mins. Yet, even during the first wave of attacks, Danish was beaten by three hundredths by World Championship dominator Maximo Quiles.

Third to fifth places initially went to the Spanish trio of Brian Uriarte, Alvaro Carpe and Intact hopeful David Almansa, who had set the fastest time in FP2. With Scott Ogden and Eddie O’Shea, two Britons were also in the top 10 with five minutes to go.

The final minutes proved particularly thrilling due to the 5.4 km length of the circuit and the correspondingly long lap time. With fresh tyres, the Moto3 riders had just one flying lap left to secure the best starting position for the ninth GP of the season. Ironically, it was the championship leader who ran out of luck. Quiles was forced to park his CFMOTO-liveried KTM in the pits two minutes before the chequered flag due to a mechanical failure.

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Whilst the MotoGP champion’s protégé waited in the garage, the battle for pole position raged on the track. Uriarte and Carpe battled it out, but the KTM Ajo riders fell short. David Almansa fared better. In an impressive solo lap, the Intact rider set a new lap record of 2:04.069 minutes to take pole position – it was Almansa’s third consecutive pole. Hakim Danish also overtook Quiles. Third place went to the World Championship leader. Starting from the second row on Sunday, Carpe, Uriarte and – much to the delight of the English Mlav team – Eddie O’Shea will be chasing points.