Efren Vazquez claimed his first Grand Prix pole position at the 111th attempt after edging out Jack Miller at Le Mans. The Spaniard had gone fastest in final practice this morning and followed it up with the fastest ever Moto3 lap of Le Mans in the afternoon to take pole.
The session had been dominated by Miller who set a 1:42.960 on his first run to initially open up a half second lead. Niklas Ajo was the nearest challenger early on before being demoted by Alexis Masbou at the halfway stage but any hopes the home crowd had of their rider claiming pole position disappeared in the gravel trap at Musée, Masbou losing the front end of his Honda and crashing out.
With Alexis out of contention, Efren emerged as the likely threat to Miller’s pole position and with four minutes remaining, Vazquez set a 1:42.634 to snatch top spot away from the Australian. Jack did respond on his last lap of the session but a further improvement from Vazquez had taken pole out of the championship leader’s reach.
Alex Rins put in a late flyer to snatch third from Masbou despite being baulked by Juanfran Guevara at the final corner with Masbou relegated to the second row where he will be joined by Niklas Ajo and Isaac Vinales. Alex Marquez will have work to do tomorrow from seventh on the grid while John McPhee will go in search of points from eighth. Zulfahmi Khairuddin will line up ninth with the top ten rounded out by championship contender Romano Fenati who will have to repeat his heroics from Jerez if he wants victory tomorrow.
