Pol Espargaro will start from his fifth pole position of the Moto2™ season at the Tissot Australian Grand Prix. Rivals Tito Rabat and Scott Redding qualified second and tenth, crashing in separate incidents during the qualifying session with the championship leader later being ruled out of action for the race.

A dramatic day of qualifying at Phillip Island drew to a close with the intermediate category, with the session being interrupted with red flags following a crash for Thai Honda PTT Gresini Moto2’s Thitipong Warokorn. As the Thai rider was transported away for medical check-ups and soon diagnosed with a fracture to his right scapula, ruling him out of action for the rest of the race event, Rabat was effectively given extra time for bike repairs as he made his way back to the Tuenti HP 40 garage following a crash of his own.

No sooner had Rabat rejoined the session than the Spaniard crashed once again, having by this point lost provisional pole to teammate Espargaro who will start in front thanks to his leading lap time of 1’32.530. Rabat missed out by just one hundredth of a second, while there were identical times for Jordi Torres and Alex de Angelis; the former (Aspar Team Moto2) will start third by virtue of his quicker second best lap time, leaving the NGM Mobile Forward Racing rider fourth.

Tom Luthi rounds out the top five for Interwetten Paddock Moto2 Racing, while Mika Kallio will be the leading Marc VDS Racing Team rider in sixth; however, the Finn suffered a sizeable accident in the Hay Shed section. Just moments later, teammate Redding crashed at the end of the lap and was later taken to hospital with a fractured left wrist; crucially, he will miss Sunday’s race. Having already posted his 1’32.962 lap time, Redding sank to tenth position in the results and soon headed towards Melbourne for further assessment on a suspected left wrist fracture.

More drama came at the end of the session, with reigning Moto3™ World Champion Sandro Cortese being the last to suffer an incident. The Dynavolt Intact GP rider will start seventh on the grid behind Kallio, while Aspar’s Nico Terol and NGM Mobile Racing’s Mattia Pasini fill positions eight and nine ahead of the unfortunate Redding.

Sunday’s Moto2™ Tissot Australian Grand Prix starts at 2:20pm local time (GMT +11). The race will take place over the shortened distance of 13 laps.

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