Sam Lowes scored a disappointing eighth in Moto2 qualifying this afternoon ahead of his Marc VDS squad’s 200th Grand Prix at Barcelona.

Having exhibited excellent potential throughout the CatalanGP weekend so far, the Brit derailed his FP3 progress with a front-end crash at the revised turn 10 during Saturday morning’s action. Despite this, he remained inside the top-nine with consistent 1’44 pace before setting his sights on qualifying.

Securing his fastest lap of the weekend in Q2 - a 1’43.693 - Lowes was separated from the front row by less than three-tenths at the flag, leaving him eighth overall and in the middle of row three but confident of a decent points haul in Sunday’s 22-lap battle.

“It was a bad qualifying” Lowes admitted as the session concluded.

“We can’t deny that, because eighth position is not where any of us expect to finish. It’s not a disaster either because it is one of my worst results in Q2 since coming into this team but I’m still in the top-10. When you look at it like that it is not that bad.

“I’ve had a good feeling on the bike all weekend, but it just wasn’t the same in Q2. We need to analyse why that was but my speed on worn tyres in the second half of the race tomorrow looks to be strong and we need to make a good start and stay in the group to score some decent points.

“I don’t ever need extra motivation but it will be nice to have a good result for the team tomorrow.”