Catalunya MotoGP Qualifying Results | Espargaro tastes sweet home town pole

Aleix Espargaro lived up to his billing in qualifying for the Catalunya MotoGP as he took a popular hometown pole position at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, Round 9 of the 2022 MotoGP season.

In the year that has seen the experienced Espargaro enjoy a breakthrough 13th MotoGP season on the competitive Aprilia, the Spaniard - who grew in the town of Granollers, fewer than five miles from the circuit - particularly covets success in this race.

Having built up to qualifying with a new lap benchmark in FP3, it would take another record-breaker in the all-important grid deciding session to fend off a strong challenge from Pecco Bagnaia.

Indeed, though the Italian was up on his rival coming into Sector 4, he’d end the lap 0.031secs short of a third pole position in four races.

On an afternoon of mixed fortunes for the title contenders, Fabio Quartararo - who leads Espargaro by eight points in the standings - gets underway from third position on the Yamaha. Enea Bastianini, however, failed to progress past Q1 and will start 14th.

A strong final effort from Johann Zarco lifted him to the front of the second row in fourth position, while surprise Mugello pole winner Fabio di Giannantonio continued his impressive single lap momentum with fifth on the grid. Jorge Martin completed an all-Ducati second row in sixth.

Alex Rins brought some satisfaction to Suzuki with a solid run to seventh, ahead of Espargaro’s Aprilia team-mate Maverick Vinales and Mugello front row starter Luca Marini.

Pol Espargaro, Jack Miller and Takaaki Nakagami completed the top twelve positions, ahead of Marco Bezzecchi and Bastianini, the latter two the best of the riders who didn’t make it through to Q2.

Elsewhere, KTM’s challenge is headed up by Brad Binder in 15th, followed by team-mate and 2021 Catalunya MotoGP winner Miguel Oliveira.