Quartararo makes history with another pole at Spanish Grand Prix

Fabio Quartararo made MotoGP history at the Spanish Grand Prix after becoming the first rider to secure four consecutive pole positions at the Jerez circuit.

The 22-year-old Monster Energy Yamaha rider, who won on each of the last two occasions he clinched pole at Jerez, set an early benchmark with a time of one minute and 36.807 seconds.

He was nearly toppled from top spot by his former team-mate Franco Morbidelli, who at one point got to within 0.005 seconds of a provisional pole position. 

Frenchman Quartararo's first time ultimately would have been enough to secure pole, but he went even better with a later run.

He ended the session with a best time of one minute and 36.775 seconds to secure first spot on the front row, with a 0.057s advantage over Petronas Yamaha's Morbidelli.

"It felt really good today," Quartararo told his team's official website. "Jerez is one of the tracks that I really like. I have ridden a Yamaha four times at this track and four times I got pole position. It's quite an amazing moment, I'm really happy about this.

"But I will say that today's Q2 session was a qualifying where I was more on the limit. I thought I was going to crash in turn six and turn 13. I made a mistake in turn six, but ultimately what matters is that we got the pole position today.

"Tomorrow it's not going to be easy, but I feel prepared and that I have good potential. The medium and hard tyres are both working well, so we will use the warm-up tomorrow to decide which one we will use."

Ducati team-mates Jack Miller and Francesco Bagnaia will start in third and fourth respectively, ahead of LCR Honda rider Takaaki Nakagami in fifth.

Repsol Honda's former world champion Marc Marquez, meanwhile, put in a career-worst qualifying performance and will start Sunday’s race in 14th.

Provisional classification

1. Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha) 1:36.775
2. Franco Morbidelli (Petronas Yamaha) + 0.057s
3. Jack Miller (Ducati) + 0.105s
4. Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati) + 0.205s
5. Takaaki Nakagami (LCR Honda) + 0.253s
6. Johann Zarco (Pramac Racing) + 0.299s
7. Maverick Vinales (Monster Energy Yamaha) + 0.315s
8. Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia) + 0.330s
9. Alex Rins (Suzuki Ecstar) + 0.369s
10. Joan Mir (Suzuki Ecstar) + 0.399s
11. Brad Binder (Red Bull KTM) + 0.712s
12. Stefan Bradl (Honda HRC) + 0.747s