2018 MotoGP season gets underway in Qatar
The opening day of the Grand Prix of Qatar saw Repsol Honda’s Marc Marquez and Dani Pedrosa wrapping up the Friday evening action at Losail International Circuit in sixth and seventh place respectively and split by 0.001”, both of them less than half of a second down on top.
This year’s revised schedule meant that MotoGP FP1 took place in the afternoon’s daylight, while FP2 was run completely at night. Temperature’s and conditions were therefore quite different between the two sessions, though generally quite warm, with 31°C air, 39°C ground and 24% of humidity in the afternoon, and 25°C air, 27°C ground and 51% of humidity in the evening.
Marc Marquez
“We are happy enough with how this first day in Qatar went in general. We had the first contact with the track and had the chance to see if we were getting the same feeling we had during the test. Actually the track has changed compared to the test and we now have to adapt the setup of the bike in order to make the tyres working well. Tomorrow we will see if we can get closer to the riders that are ahead of us who, at the moment, seems to have something more.”
Dani Pedrosa
“Conditions were a bit different from the test and consequently our feeling was different. Two weeks ago at the end of the three days the asphalt was in quite good conditions while today it was a bit dirty. At the beginning we were less comfortable but we improved over the day and that’s positive. We can see that our rivals are fast, but lap times are quite tight and there are many riders on almost the same time. We have to see tomorrow how conditions we’ll be.”
Free Practice 2 Classification
| Pos. | Rider | Num | Nation | Team | Constructor | Time/Gap |
|---|
Location Information
The fabulous Lusail International Circuit lies on the outskirts of Doha, the capital city of Qatar. Built in little over a year, the track cost $58 million USD and required round-the-clock dedication from almost 1,000 workers in order to get it ready for the inaugural event – the Marlboro Grand… read more.
| Length | 5.380 kilometres / 3.343 miles |
| Width | 12 metres |
| Left corners | 6 |
| Right corners | 10 |
| Longest straight | 1.068 kilometres / 0.664 miles |
| Constructed | 2004 |
Losail International Circuit, Al Daayen, Qatar - View in Google Maps
Records
| Pole Position | 1m 50.789s (174.8km/h) Jorge Martin (Ducati, 2024) |
| Race Lap | 1m 52.978s (171.4 km/h) Enea Bastianini (Ducati, 2023) |
| 2024 Sprint Winner | Jorge Martin (Ducati) |
| 2024 Race Winner | Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati) |
