During the morning warm-up, Austrian MotoGP pole qualifying Marco Bezzecchi returned to the top timesheets.
Alex Marquez, KTM’s Enea Bastiani, and Marc Marquez, the title leader, were all ahead of Marc Marquez, who finished fourth in Sprint.
Jack Miller’s Pramac Yamaha was having technical problems, and he ended up last.
Marc Marquez, the winner of Saturday’s Sprint race, has never won Austrian Grand Prix in his seven previous appearances. The Red Bull Ring is the top four tracks where he has not been able to win.
Alex Marquez, the runner-up in yesterday’s sprint race for the Czech Republic, will serve a lengthy lap penalty today. He collided with Joan Mir.
Maverick Viales of Tech3 KTM and Franco Morbidelli of VR46, who missed the previous Brno event due to injuries sustained at Sachsenring, both returned for the first MotoGP event since the summer break.
Vinales, however, withdrew on Saturday from the Red Bull Ring due to his shoulder’s healing condition and will miss the Hungarian MotoGP next weekend.
Somkiat Chantra, a rookie with LCR Honda, is still recovering after knee surgery. He is missing his third consecutive event.
This weekend, only one LCR is in action, as Takaaki Nagagami, the HRC test-rider who replaced Chantra in Brno and was also injured, replaces him.
Marco Bezzecchi, Austrian Grand Prix polesitter, hopes to “find something else” in the Sunday’s feature event after missing out on the podium in the Sprint.
The Aprilia factory rider failed to convert his pole position in the sprint race on Saturday. He finished fourth, behind the Marquez Brothers and Pedro Acosta.
The Italian driver was the fastest during the warm-up at the Red Bull Ring on Sunday morning, giving some hope that the Italian could fight Ducati and KTM for the Grand Prix.
Bezzecchi, who admitted that he wasn’t up to the challenge of his rivals in the main race on Saturday can take comfort in knowing that Aprilia has a history of making significant improvements overnight. Bezzecchi remembers the improvement Aprilia made at the Dutch Grand Prix between Saturday and Sunday in June when he was able to push Marc Marquez in the main race.
Bezzecchi’s pole in Austria was a stark contrast to a Friday when the team struggled, and Bezzecchi ranked only 18th. The turnaround was largely due to tips from Valentino Rossi and other improvements in set-up.
After the race on Saturday, he stated: “The sprint was just as I had expected.” “OK, we did a lot better in qualifying than yesterday but there is still some work to be done in terms of speed. This morning [in FP2], I worked [on the race setup], but it didn’t go as I had hoped. It wasn’t enough.
