After three 15th places in practice, Miguel Oliveira managed to improve considerably and is back in a Q2 – something he hadn’t achieved this season yet. The Trackhouse Racing man was second in the first phase of qualifying for the French GP at Le Mans.
Equipped with two soft tires on his Aprilia RS-GP, the Almada native had his first flying lap canceled, but on the second attempt he positioned himself in a qualifying spot: second place.
At that time, he was only 0.066s off the lead of Marc Márquez (Gresini/Ducati), with a lead of less than two tenths over the rival immediately behind – his teammate, Raúl Fernández.
After that, Oliveira made the usual trip to the garage before returning to the track for the final attacks on the clock. His first attempt in this final phase was canceled for cutting the track – when he had already dropped to third.
But on the final lap, the Portuguese rider managed to improve and returned to second place, beating Márquez by 0.108s to secure a spot in the second phase of qualifying.
- Run 1: New soft tire in front and new soft tire in the back
- Lap 1: Pit exit
- Lap 2: Lap canceled
- Lap 3: 1m30.652s
- Lap 4: Pit entry
- Exit 2: Used soft tire in front and new soft tire in rear
- Lap 5: Pit lane exit
- Lap 6: Lap invalidated
- Lap 7: 1m30.478s (end of qualifying)
