Yamaha's Maverick Vinales beat teammate Fabio Quartararo to take the pole position for the 2021 MotoGP Dutch Grand Prix at Assen. The rider also set a new lap record in the process with a time of 1m31.814s, 0.071s ahead of Quartararo. Meanwhile, the Frenchman made a mistake on the last lap of the session but still starts from the front-row making it a 1-2 start for Yamaha. Joining the riders will be Ducati's Francesco Bagnaia who qualified third in the session, while LCR's Takaaki Nakagami, Johann Zarco and Miguel Oliveira start from the second row.
Alex Rins after running high in the initial stages, fell at the end of the session, lowsiding at Turn 8. The Suzuki rider starts at P7, ahead of Ducati's Jack Miller and Aleix Espargaro on the Aprilia. Joan Mir of Suzuki starts at P10.
VIÑALES TAKES POLE AT ASSEN!
— MotoGP (@MotoGP) June 26, 2021
The Spaniard wins a spectacular shootout between the @YamahaMotoGP team-mates! #DutchGP pic.twitter.com/cfGGKzkxb5
Honda rider Pol Espargaro will start at P11 tomorrow, but fresh off the win at Sachsenring, Marc Marquez isn't having the best weekend so far. The rider is still limping from yesterday's crash and failed to make it into Q2 after a late fall today. He starts 20th tomorrow. Interestingly, both Honda riders will be trying out a new chassis this weekend. Lastly, SRT's Valentino Rossi was the last of the Q2 qualifiers and starts at P12.
The race will also see a shuffle in the rider line-up tomorrow with an injured Franco Morbidelli replaced by the Garett Gerloff on the SRT Yamaha machine. The rider currently competes in WSBK for GRT Yamaha and previously took part in the wet practice session at the 2020 Valencia GP, as Rossi awaited his PCR result.
Marc Marquez had a crash in the initial stages of the race
Iker Lecuona of Tech 3 KTM will start 13th, ahead of Jorge Martin of Pramac and Lorenzo Savadori of Aprilia. Starting behind him will be Alex Marquez of LCR, followed by Luca Marini of Avintia Racing. Danilo Petrucci of Tech 3 KTM start at P18, followed Avintia's Enea Bastiniani and Marc Marquez. Brad Binder and Garrett Gerloff round up the grid for tomorrow.
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