Bagnaia delivers ‘incredible lap’ to claim pole, ‘very happy’ about lap record

Francesco Bagnaia put Ducati’s impressive final sector advantage to good use by claiming pole position for the Aragon MotoGP. 

The Italian was on par with Fabio Quartararo throughout the first three sectors, however, Bagnaia gained over three tenths on the back-straight and final corner. 

Bagnaia’s pole lap was also a new lap record as he eclipsed Marc Marquez’ previous best from 2015.

"I’m very happy. I started the weekend with a lot of questions about this track because I struggle a lot every year on this track and my best result was in Moto2 when I finished second," said Bagnaia. 

"But, it was the only year where I was competitive here. But, when I started these two days here in FP1 the feeling was already great. 

"I was happy about the bike, so in this moment I didn’t touch the bike or anything on my setting. The bike is still the same and I just improved our pace and then in FP4 we were very competitive and also in qualifying. 

"I did a lap that was incredible and in the last sector I just entered the final corner as fast as I could and the bike just let me turn, so it was incredible the lap time. 

"This is the sixth year of the record by Marquez and this is the first time we beat it, so I’m very happy about that also." 

Surprisingly, it seems as though the soft rear tyre is the preferred option heading into tomorrow’s race, even though track temperatures have been extremely hot. 

It’s also Bagnaia’ favoured option as it stands due to the ‘consistency and grip’, after an FP4 run that saw him finish third. 

Bagnaia added: "I think that the soft tyre is a great combination of grip and constancy. With the hard in FP3 it was not so bad, but it dropped more than the soft. 

"Today I did 16 laps in the FP4 and when I started (the session) the tyre (soft) already had eight laps. 

"The pace was constant and I tried different types of maps to be competitive tomorrow, also in the last part of the race. 

"In this track it’s strange because you can use full power for all the duration of the race I think, because you can better manage the circuit grip."