MotoGP: Who’s Starting Where in Teruel?

By Short Shift News
Following a fierce Saturday afternoon in Teruel, the MotoGP qualifying results have undergone some serious revision, with riders losing and then having their laps restituted, so who starts where?
Late in the second 15-minute qualifying session, Esponsorama Racing’s Johann Zarco slid out of the running with a final corner crash, resulting in a yellow flag.
New for 2020, when a yellow flag is displayed, any rider to ride through the ‘hazard zone’ will automatically lose their laps in a bid to reduce the speed that riders ride through a corner when Marshalls and crashed riders are in the gravel trap.
So, who rode through the yellow flag zone?
Well first of all, Fabio Quartararo. The fast Frenchman was halfway down the back straight when Zarco tipped off, meaning that he would arrive into turn 16, meeting the yellow flag caused by his countryman. However, as the clock ran down after the session, Fabio was not one of the riders to lose their laps, instead, Cal Crutchlow, Miguel Oliveira, Joan Mir and Alex Marquez all had their laps deleted.
No such drama affected the front two rows with Takaaki Nakagami securing his maiden MotoGP pole position, with Franco Morbidelli and Alex Rins alongside.
Crutchlow, who had originally put his LCR Honda Castrol bike at the front of the third row, suddenly dropped a position to Pol Espargaro, who was originally ninth. Iker Lecuona, who finished his maiden Q2 appearance in 11th had jumped up to ninth. Marquez was tenth; he found his best lap deleted and dropped to 11th. However, since the end of Q2, all those laps have been returned, meaning the grid will be set from the results as the flag fell.
The reason for the reverse decision comes after Race Direction deemed the yellow flag ‘too short’. Race control said that the yellow flags were out for such a short period of time that no riders saw them, and that as a result they gave back the times they had originally cancelled.
This means Crutchlow will start from his seventh-place grid slot, with Oliveira and Espargaro alongside him. Alex Marquez lines up in tenth place with Lecuona and Mir alongside, who could’ve been over four seconds off the pace had his lap remained deleted.
For the full Teruel Grand Prix grid, click here
Featured image: MotoGP.com

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