Aron Canet claimed a dominant pole position for the Grand Prix of the Americas in Austin, continuing a weekend where he has looked in a different league to his Moto3 rivals. The Estrella Galicia 0,0 rider was almost a full second ahead of championship leader Joan Mir in second place, suggesting the usual Moto3 pack race won’t be on the cards tomorrow.
Throughout the entire 40 minute session, Canet was the only rider to hold pole position at any stage with the Spaniard dropping into the low 2:15s range on his first run. As the session panned out, Aron had actually done enough for pole already but the 17-year-old went faster still with eight minutes remaining, opening up an almost unthinkable 1.4 second lead over the field.
The challengers managed to close the gap late on with Mir climbing from fourteenth to second, 0.987s off, while last year’s COTA winner Romano Fenati claimed the other front row starting spot after becoming the only other rider to get within a second of pole.
Nicolo Bulega will start fourth ahead of the two Gresini Hondas of Jorge Martin and Fabio Di Giannantonio while under-pressure Italians Enea Bastianini and Niccolo Antonelli qualified seventh and eighth as they look to kick-start their seasons. John McPhee rescued his session with a last-gasp flyer, moving from twentieth to ninth, with Bo Bendsneyder completing the top ten.
