MADRID, 23 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Spanish riders Manu González (Kalex), in Moto2; and José Antonio Rueda (KTM), in Moto3; This Saturday they achieved pole positions, the first in their careers, for the races in their respective categories of the Portuguese Grand Prix, the second round of the motorcycle World Championship, both after breaking the absolute track record in Portimao.
In the intermediate displacement, the Madrid native guaranteed himself the first pole of his life by stopping the clock at 1:41.514, lowering by two tenths the circuit record that he himself had established in the morning. “It was an impressive qualifying for me, I knew I was very fast alone. We are strong for tomorrow,” he highlighted after Q2.
In the front row he will be accompanied by two other Spaniards, Fermín Aldeguer (Boscoscuro) and Arón Canet (Kalex) – poleman in Qatar -, second and third respectively, with the championship leader, Alonso López (Boscoscuro), in fourth position leading a second line in which Albert Arenas (Kalex), sixth, will also be there.
The Italian Tony Arbolino (Kalex) was in charge of setting the first reference time at the Autódromo Internacional do Algarve, who ruled the session until with nine minutes remaining Albert Arenas managed to surpass him.
However, the 2020 Moto3 champion was soon displaced from first place by Aldeguer, who became the first to go below 1:42 (1:41.941) to command Q2. One lap later, he improved his time (1: 41.758), but first Canet (1: 41.746) and then Manu González (1: 41.514) knocked him off the top, although he took one lap away to get second.
Meanwhile, Sergio García Dols (Boscoscuro), podium finisher in Qatar, will start from eighth place, with Jeremy Alcoba (Kalex) and Marcos Ramírez (Kalex) tenth and eleventh, respectively. Among those who stayed in Q1, Izan Guevara (Kalex) will start twenty-second, Jaume Masià (Kalex) twenty-third and Alex Escrig (Forward) twenty-fourth.
In Moto3, José Antonio Rueda (KTM) also signed a record pole ahead of the Australian Joel Kelso (KTM) and the Colombian David Alonso (CFMoto).
With an extraordinary time of 1:46.379 with the clock at zero, the Sevillian signed the first pole of his life in the last moments, which will allow him to lead the first row of the grid. “I felt pretty good with the bike. There was a lot of dust, but after the MotoGP rode on the track, the conditions improved a lot,” Rueda revealed after Q2.
His mark helped him surpass Joel Kelso by 59 thousandths, who minutes before had established the new absolute circuit record in the small category. The championship leader, Alonso, finished one tenth behind, who will complete the first starting row.
In addition, Dani Holgado (GasGas), second two weeks ago in Qatar, guaranteed himself a fourth position on the grid. Meanwhile, Iván Ortolá (KTM) will start seventh; Joel Esteban (CFMoto) will start eleventh; David Muñoz (KTM) will do thirteenth; Adrián Fernández (Honda) fifteenth and Vicente Pérez (KTM), eighteenth. Ángel Piqueras (Honda), the only Spaniard who could not advance to Q2, will start nineteenth.
2024-03-23 13:47:15
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