Aprilia’s Jorge Martin will start the Japanese Grand Prix from pole position after breaking the circuit record in Saturday’s qualifying session at Motegi.
The 2024 MotoGP champion will line up just in front of Ducati rival Marc Marquez, who won the sprint race on Saturday and has vowed to attack in the remaining rounds of the season.
Completing the front row will be Austrian GP winner Pedro Acosta, meaning the top three places on the grid will be occupied by riders representing three different manufacturers.
Starting fourth will be Martin’s team-mate Marco Bezzecchi, who lost significant ground in the title fight with an ill-judged move to start on medium tyres in the sprint.
Alex Marquez will line up in fifth place on Gresini but will have to serve a double long lap penalty for taking out Acosta and Fabio di Giannantonio on Saturday.
Di Giannantonio will start just behind the younger Marquez in seventh, while Enea Bastianini will take the start from seventh after narrowly missing out on a sprint podium on Saturday.
Completing the top 10 will be Raul Fernandez (Trackhouse), Diogo Moreira and Johann Zarco (both LCR). The latter will have to serve a double long lap penalty for attempting to restart his bike in the opposite direction at Turn 9 during Sunday morning’s extended warm-up.
Ai Ogura will start his home race from 11th on the grid.
Francesco Bagnaia, winner of the last two Japanese GPs aboard the factory Ducati, failed to make it into Q2 and is due to start 13th.
Michelin has banned teams from using the soft tyre in the grand prix, while suggesting the new reinforced hard compound as the primary option. The warm-up has been extended to 20 minutes to allow riders to evaluate the hard tyre. The medium compound can also be used during the race, but it has so far provided mixed results for riders.
2026 Japanese GP – Full starting grid
Cla
Nº
Rider
Bike
Time
Gap
1
89
Jorge Martín
Aprilia
1’42.371
–
2
93
Marc Márquez
Ducati
1’42.481
0.110
3
37
Pedro Acosta
KTM
1’42.493
0.122
4
72
Marco Bezzecchi
Aprilia
1’42.530
0.159
5
73
Álex Márquez
Ducati
1’42.546
0.175
6
49
Fabio Di Giannantonio
Ducati
1’42.628
0.257
7
23
Enea Bastianini
KTM
1’42.669
0.298
8
25
Raúl Fernández
Aprilia
1’42.741
0.370
9
11
Diogo Moreira
Honda
1’42.916
0.545
10
5
Johann Zarco
Honda
1’42.918
0.547
11
79
Ai Ogura
Aprilia
1’42.933
0.562
12
20
Fabio Quartararo
Yamaha
1’43.059
0.688
13
63
Francesco Bagnaia
Ducati
1’43.007
0.636
14
21
Franco Morbidelli
Ducati
1’43.136
0.765
15
15
Somkiat Chantra
Honda
1’43.196
0.825
16
10
Luca Marini
Honda
1’43.278
0.907
17
33
Brad Binder
KTM
1’43.399
1.028
18
54
Fermín Aldeguer
Ducati
1’43.419
1.048
19
12
Maverick Viñales
KTM
1’43.605
1.234
20
43
Jack Miller
Yamaha
1’43.811
1.440
21
42
Alex Rins
Yamaha
1’43.896
1.525
22
7
Toprak Razgatlıoğlu
Yamaha
1’44.031
C
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