Saturday at the 2025 MotoGP Qatar Grand Prix will see qualifying and sprint action for the fourth round of the season.
The championship has been reset coming into Saturday at the Qatar Grand Prix, with Alex Marquez taking over the lead of the standings at the previous Americas GP by a single point.
Marc Marquez's crash out of the lead of the grand prix at COTA has wiped out his championship advantage in what has so far been a dominant campaign for the factory Ducati rider.
After a tense qualifying session, Marc Marquez snatched pole to maintain his 100% qualifying record in 2025 with a new lap record.
Alex Marquez will start second, while Yamaha's Fabio Quartararo got his first front in a qualifying session since the 2022 Dutch GP.
Pecco Bagnaia crashed late on in Q2, leaving himself down in 11th on the grid on a weekend where practice form suggested his race pace was a little bit better than Marc Marquez's.
Reigning world champion Jorge Martin was an impressive 14th in his first qualifying of the year, the Aprilia rider digging deep to shadow his team-mate Marco Bezzecchi.
The sprint at 6pm BST.
Read the full qualifying report for the 2025 MotoGP Qatar Grand Prix here
It's a Marquez brothers 1-2 in Qatar qualifying. Marc Marquez used the tow from Morbidelli to put in a 1m50.499s for his fourth pole of 2025. Alex Marquez is second while Fabio Quartararo is on the front row for the first time since Assen 2022.
Bagnaia will go from 11th on a weekend where he has the pace to fight with his team-mate. Nightmare.
Marc Marquez snatches pole by 0.101s!
Bagnaia shuffled back to 11th as the chequered flag comes out.
Now Alex Marquez takes pole with a minute to go with a new lap record of 1m50.6s.
Quartararo fastest!
Marc Marquez backs out of this lap after a big wobble at Turn 3. Morbidelli has also backed out of this lap.
Lots of traffic mayhem happening around the Marquez brothers. Could be penalties coming.
Di Giannantonio improves to second, 0.052s off Marc Marquez.
Bagnai has crashed! He's gone down at Turn 4 while fastest in sector one. That is qualifying over and he will do no better than ninth.
The Marquez brothers return to the track, though neither looks like they want to lead.
Big lap needed from Bagnaia. He's 0.703s off his team-mate's pace and this isn't what we expected after Friday.
Order as it stands with seven minutes to go:
Good lap from Quartararo, he's put the Yamaha up to fourth.
Marc Marquez doesn't improve on this lap, while Alex Marquez closes to within 0.190s of his brother in second. Morbidelli up to third. Bagnaia only eighth after his first run.
Marc Marquez sets the early pace at a 1m50.877s while following Alex Marquez, who goes into second - 0.312s off the pace.
Typically when Marquez is following someone it means he's not got the outright pace to take pole himself.
Marc Marquez isn't doing his first lap on his own. He's tried to tuck into the tow of Alex Marquez, but is being hounded by Acosta.
Alex Marquez had a crash in the prior FP2 session. Hopefully his Gresini team has managed to get that damaged bike fixed in time for Q2.
Pitlane is open for the pole battle!
The riders battling for pole are:
Big disappointment for KTM in that session. Last year's Qatar podium finisher Binder will go from 18th, while Bastianini is 20th.
Mir won't be happy with 21st on the factory Honda.
Martin was only 0.143s outside of a Q2 spot, which really isn't bad going at all.
Ogura, incidentally, was over four tenths clear of the field with his lap. Watch out for him in Q2.
Marco Bezzecchi misses out by 0.041s and will start 13th, while reigning champion Jorge Martin is a brilliant 14th on the grid given the circumstances.
Luca Marini will be 15th ahead of Jack Miller, Raul Fernandez, Brad Binder, Augusto Fernandez, Enea Bastianini, Joan Mir, Somkiat Chantra.
