Qualifying day at Phillip Island with points on the line in the Sprint

After the riders in all three Grand Prix classes tackled tricky conditions on Friday, there is still a lot of head scratching going on in the pitlane to make the bikes fast, easy on their tyres or, the really hard part – both!

MotoGP™ action starts with a 30-minute Free Practice at 10:10 am before the bottom half of the field lines up for the first Qualifying session at 10:50 am. The top two from that session will advance to Q2, where the all-important pole position will be determined, starting at 11:30 am.

The Tissot Sprint, over 13 laps, is due to start at 3:00 p.m. Jorge Martin has been the form rider in the shorter races so far this season, but it would be a brave person to have him hold off the field again in the 20-minute dash. It is unusual to see Ducati’s older 2023 racer ahead of this year’s bikes, but that is just what happened on Friday when Marc Marquez, Alex Marquez, and Marco Bezzecchi led the sole practice session.

Saturday will kick off with Practice sessions for Moto3™ (8:30 a.m.) and Moto2™ (9:15 a.m.). The final Practice session for MotoGP™ will start at 10:00 a.m., with the first Qualifying session due to begin at 10:50 a.m.

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The two-stage Moto3™ Qualifying sessions will start at 12:50 pm, with Jacob Roulstone pushing hard to make it through to the second stage of qualifying at 1:15 pm, where Joel Kelso is already one of the riders ready and waiting to take him on in Q2.

The best in the business in Moto2™ are next, with Q1 at 1:45 pm, followed by the second session at 2:10 pm, with Harrison Voight making an impressive Moto2™ debut to be right behind Senna Agius, both right on the brink of making it into Q2 – so the battle will be well and truly on.

Don’t forget that the kids with stars in their eyes will be on the track as well, in two seven-lap races for the bLU cRU Oceania Junior Cup races. In the all-Yamaha R3 field, the rising stars of motorcycle racing will take to the Phillip Island Grand Prix Circuit twice on Saturday for two seven-lap races, the first at 12:15 p.m. and then again later in the afternoon at 4:15 p.m.