2014 Qatar MotoGP Qualifying ResultsSix weeks ago, the reigning MotoGP Champion Marc Marquez suffered a major setback – the Repsol Honda pilot broke leg during a dirt-track training accident.
This caused the 21-year-old Spaniard to miss the two final preseason test sessions. And at the first Sepang preseason test, Marquez was untouchable, making his absence even worse for the Repsol Honda team.And things started slowly at free practice for the opening round of 2014 MotoGP at Qatar’s Losail Circuit. But this wasn’t the case during Saturday’s qualifying – Marquez earned the pole with impressive 1:54.507 around the 3.34-mile circuit containing 16 corners.Joining Marquez on the front row will be two Open-option machines – the GO&FUN Honda Gresini RC213V piloted by Alvaro Bautista and the Monster Tech 3 Yamaha piloted by Bradley Smith.Bautista had the provisional pole, but finished qualifying 0.057 of a second back. Smith, who suffered a huge high side during Friday’s FP3, finished only 0.037 of a second behind Bautista. This was his first-ever front-row qualifying result.Ducati Team’s Andrea Dovizioso placed the Ducati Team GP14, which runs under the Open-option rules, qualified fourth on top of the second row. He will be joined by Movistar Yamaha MotoGP’s Jorge Lorenzo, who took the last two wins at Losail, and Repsol Honda’s Dani Pedrosa. The latter two have both struggled at Losail.LCR Honda MotoGP’s Stefan Bradl qualifying seventh, 0.364 of a second behind Marquez, and will be joined by Q1 participant Ducati Team’s Cal Crutchlow.Rounding out the top 10 was NGM Forward Racing’ Yamaha’sAleix Espargaro and Movistar Yamaha MotoGP’s Valentino Rossi. Espargaro led the first three free practice sessions by a huge margin, but appeared to succumb to the pressure of Q2, crashing twice.As for the Americans, NGM Forward Racing’s Colin Edwards qualified 14th, 1.249 seconds back, and Drive M7 Aspar Honda’s Nicky hayed 16th, 1.409 second back.The riders will return to Losail Sunday for the opening race of 2014 MotoGP, which will be televised on Fox Sports 1 live at 2:30 p.m. ET. For a preview of the round, visit 2014 Qatar MotoGP Preview.2014 Qatar MotoGP Qualifying Results:
Hello everyone and welcome once again to Motos and Friends, the weekly podcast brought to you by Ultimate Motorcycling. My name is Arthur Coldwells.
Motos and Friends is brought to you by Yamaha. You can check out the amazing YZF-R7 at your local Yamaha dealer, or of course at YamahaMotorsports.com. The YZF-R7 is an amazing supersport machine that is comfortable too!
In this week’s first segment, Editor Don Williams takes the smallest BMW ADV bike on an urban adventure in Los Angeles. The BMW G 310 GS is a full size motorcycle with a modest engine, so of course we wonder if it is a little too underpowered and might struggle. Don put it through its paces and gives us his take.
In the second segment, Neale Bayly and Kiran Ridley have returned from the Ukraine to Paris where Kiran is based.
Kiran is an award winning photojournalist, and as an accomplished documentarian, he has covered stories as diverse as drug smuggling around the Mexican border, to the devastation of the Australian Bush Fires, to the tragedy of the Mediterranean migration crisis. Neale and Kiran reminisce about their motorcycle adventure in the Ukraine, and their observations and experiences with the incredibly resilient people of Ukraine, who have been put through such brutal hardship.
