British Grand Prix Silverstone MotoGP Q.2: Lorenzo, Dovizioso… and Zarco!

Bradley Smith and Alex Rins were drafted into Q.1 and joined Andrea Dovizioso, Cal Crutchlow, Maverick Vinales, Marc Márquez, Jorge Lorenzo, Jack Miller, Danilo Petrucci, Johann Zarco, Valentino Rossi and Andrea Iannone to face each other in Q.2.

The temperatures are 16° in the air and 25° on the ground but the track is still wet following the heavy downpour that occurred in FP4.

Here are the available chronometric references:

Silverstone MotoGP™	2017	2018
FP1	2'02.130 Maverick Vinales (See here)	2'02.073 Maverick Vinales (See here)
FP2	2'00.897 Cal Crutchlow (See here)	2'01.385 Andrea Dovizioso (See here)
FP3	2'01.734 Johann Zarco (See here)	2'01.866 Cal Crutchlow (See here)
FP4	2'01.060 Jorge Lorenzo (See here)	2'01.571 Maverick Vinales (See here)
Qualification 1	2'00.830 Dani Pedrosa (See here)	2'13.340 Bradley Smith (See here)
Qualification 2	1'59.941 Marc Marquez (See here)	2'10.155 Jorge Lorenzo
Warm Up	2'01.622 Andrea Iannone (See here)
Course	Dovizioso, Vinales, Rossi (See here)
All time lap record	1'59.941 Marc Marquez 2017

Confusion arises from the first minutes of the session because at the moment when a few are driving including Jorge Lorenzo set off into the pit lane, the session is postponed by the race direction.

Suddenly, the Ducati rider goes up the pit lane in the opposite direction to reach his box…

This postponement is due to the absence of the medical helicopter which took away Tito Rabat to a hospital center.

When the green lights appear, Jorge Lorenzo leads the pack while on the contrary Johann zarco prefers to give his opponents some space.

All the drivers are on rain tires, even if the circuit is now well separated into 2 parts, one completely dry, and the other still wet.

Difficult conditions in which you will have to be smart to succeed…

The fastest first flying lap and credited the surprising Bradley Smith who achieves 2'12.894, a faster time than the one which allowed him to reach Q1.

Maverick Vinales, who was on the soft rear, stopped immediately to put on a medium tire like almost all of his opponents.

In the next passage, Jack Miller leads the operations in 2'12.173 ahead Andrea Dovizioso and Danilo Petrucci.

Johann zarco then moved to second place, 3/10 behind the Australian driver.

Jorge Lorenzo then achieves the best time in 2'12.001, preceding Marc Márquez from 8/1000.

5 minutes from the end of the session, Jack Miller is the first to take to the track on slick tires.

This is the moment when Johann zarco decides to launch his forces into battle and seizes command in 2'11.219 ahead Cal Crutchlow.

Meanwhile, Jack Miller runs on eggshells and misses at the end of the straight: he still has one last lap to do with his slicks!

Just before the checkered flag, Andrea Dovizioso et Jorge Lorenzo light the first sectors in red. The first city took provisional pole position in 2'10.314 before the second took it away in 2'10.155.

In extremis, Cal Crutchlow is invited to the first line, to the detriment of Johann zarco, but the Tech3 driver improves his time and recovers his property.

Silverstone MotoGP Q2 British Grand Prix standings:

Tire credit and classification: MotoGP.com