Assen MotoGP: Alvaro Bautista on provisional 250 pole

Alvaro Bautista has put himself on provisional pole for Saturday’s 250GP in Assen after setting the best time of the first qualifying session this afternoon.

The Aprilia rider knocked almost a second off his best time this morning, when he was second fastest to post a 1:39.510 right at the end of the session.

Marco Simoncelli looked set to carry on his impressive form from this morning as he topped the timesheets at the beginning of the session with a 1:41.433 and was top again with 10 minutes left. But the Italian crashed out of the session whilst on top with two minutes to go and so could not respond to Bautista’s final lap.

Hector Barbera also beat Simoncelli’s last lap to go provisional second on his Team Toth Aprilia with a best lap of 1:39.741. Aleix Espargaro rounds off the front row in fourth with his best lap recorded at 1:40.210.

Also crashing out of the session were Russel Gomez who limped away from his Aprilia and Hiroshi Aoyama, fortunately he was uninjured.

Assen MotoGP 250 first qualifying results:

1 Alvaro BAUTISTA SPA Mapfre Aspar Team APRILIA 1’39.510
2 Hector BARBERA SPA Team Toth Aprilia APRILIA 1’39.741
3 Marco SIMONCELLI ITA Metis Gilera GILERA 1’39.978
4 Aleix ESPARGARO SPA Lotus Aprilia APRILIA 1’40.210
5 Thomas LUTHI SWI Emmi – Caffe Latte APRILIA 1’40.455
6 Julian SIMON SPA Repsol KTM 250cc KTM 1’40.686
7 Lukas PESEK CZE Auto Kelly – CP APRILIA 1’40.742
8 Alex DEBON SPA Lotus Aprilia APRILIA 1’40.744
9 Yuki TAKAHASHI JPN JiR Team Scot 250 HONDA 1’40.796
10 Mika KALLIO FIN Red Bull KTM 250 KTM 1’40.849
11 Fabrizio LAI ITA Campetella Racing GILERA 1’40.862
12 Hector FAUBEL SPA Mapfre Aspar Team APRILIA 1’41.178
13 Manuel POGGIALI RSM Campetella Racing GILERA 1’41.180
14 Roberto LOCATELLI ITA Metis Gilera GILERA 1’41.285
15 Hiroshi AOYAMA JPN Red Bull KTM 250 KTM 1’41.406
16 Ratthapark WILAIROT THA Thai Honda PTT SAG HONDA 1’41.543
17 Mattia PASINI ITA Polaris World APRILIA 1’41.633
18 Karel ABRAHAM CZE Cardion AB Motoracing APRILIA 1’41.680
19 Imre TOTH HUN Team Toth Aprilia APRILIA 1’43.108
20 Eugene LAVERTY IRL Blusens Aprilia APRILIA 1’43.245
21 Alex BALDOLINI ITA Matteoni Racing APRILIA 1’43.264
22 Doni Tata PRADITA INA Yamaha Pertamina Indonesia YAMAHA 1’45.467
23 Frederik WATZ SWE Jaap Kingma Racing APRILIA 1’45.836
24 Russel GOMEZ SPA Blusens Aprilia APRILIA 1’45.974