Moto3: Masia on pole as seven set to start from pit lane

Qualifying got underway on Saturday for the second round of the 2021 Moto3 World Championship. As at round one, the race took place at the Losail International Circuit in Qatar, but things were complicated this weekend by a sandstorm on Saturday afternoon during practice, which limited the grip even in the evening’s qualifying session. 

Further complications to the starting order were confirmed yesterday, when seven riders: Pedro Acosta, Dennis Foggia, Riccardo Rossi, Stefano Nepa, Romano Fenati, Deniz Oncu and Sergio Garcia, were all given ‘pit lane start’ penalties for Sunday’s race “for riding slow and causing a disturbance between Turn 15 and Turn 16,” per a tweet from the official MotoGP Twitter account. These harsh punishments are the latest attempt to tackle irresponsible riding in the lightweight class which has been a major theme since 2014 in particular, with riders slowing on-track to find a tow. Especially in Qatar, and especially with the headwind the riders have faced on the front straight both last weekend and this, the slipstream is incredibly important in the low-powered Moto3 class, but that doesn’t excuse irresponsible and potentially dangerous riding.

The penalties did not exclude anyone from participating in qualifying, though, and one of them, Dennis Foggia, was able to make it through Q1, along with his teammate, Xavi Artigas, Jason Dupasquier and Andrea Migno who topped the session. 

Q2 saw Jaume Masia place himself perfectly behind Tatsuki Suzuki, using the Japanese rider as a marker, as well as his slipstream, to take his first pole position of 2021, six days on from his tactically-sound win-on-debut for Red Bull KTM Ajo last weekend. 

Joining Masia on the front row will be the Gresini Honda duo of Jeremy Alcoba and Gabriel Rodrigo, and Alcoba in particular will be hoping for better luck in the race than that which he had last week when he was taken out by Xavi Artigas. 

Heading up row two will be the aforementioned Tatsuki Suzuki, with fourth being a significant improvement for the Japanese rider compared to the dead last grid slot he had one week ago. Joining the #24 on row two will be Andrea Migno, who topped Q2 after the first runs, and Darryn Binder who continued his improved qualifying form compared to previous seasons with sixth (at least, when taking into account the penalties of others). 

The third row will see John McPhee in seventh, ahead of Izan Guevara and the much improved Jason Dupasquier, who continues his impressive form from last week and tomorrow will take his best ever Grand Prix grid position with ninth. 

Niccolo Antonelli will round out the top 10 on the grid, ahead of Kaito Toba and Xavi Artigas, although the #43 will have a tough job on his hands tomorrow as he faces two long lap penalties for his involvement in the crash at turn six last week which ended the respective races of McPhee, Migno and Alcoba. 

Ryusei Yamanaka will start from the head of the fifth row in 13th tomorrow, alongside Adrian Fernandez and Filip Salac; while Lorenzo Fellon will head up row six from Ayumu Sasaki and Carlos Tatay. 

The number of riders in pit lane tomorrow means the grid is significantly shorter than usual, with only seven rows and 21 riders, and filling out that seventh and final row will be Yuki Kunii, Maximilian Kofler and Andi Izdihar.

For the riders starting from pit lane, their respective qualifying positions relative to each other determine in which order they will start tomorrow. So, Sergio Garcia will take the pit lane pole position after ending qualifying in second; Pedro Acosta – who qualified ninth – will start from second in the pits; Romano Fenati and Stefano Nepa – who qualified 14th and 15th respectively – will start from third and fourth in pit lane, respectively; Dennis Foggia will start from fifth in pit lane after qualifying 18th; Riccardo Rossi will be the sixth rider in the pit lane queue after qualifying 13th, and Deniz Oncu will be the seventh and last rider in pit lane, having ended Q1 in last place.