Marquez was hospitalized after a hefty crash in FP1, but was straight out on track as FP2 began and beat Maverick Vinales‘morning benchmark within three laps.
His 1m30.891s gave him a huge early lead and while several riders took in second place, for 30 minutes the field was only able to close the gap to Marquez from seven to five tenths.
As other riders put on new rear tires for the late-session flyers, Valentino Rossi was the first one to threaten Marquez’s lead with two 1m31.0s before his teammate Vinales went fastest.
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But Vinales couldn’t improve for the rest of the session and Quartararo did instead, the Frenchman taking the lead with a 1m30.404s just a few seconds before the checkered flag fell.
He topped the session by 0.193s from Vinales, with his teammate Franco Morbidelli completing an all-Yamaha top three.
Pramac Ducatis Jack Miller was the best non-Yamaha rider in fourth with Rossi completing the top five.
Marquez did not improve on his early-session time and fell to sixth in the order with Aprilia’s Alex Espargaro taking an impressive seventh.
Factory Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso was eighth while his teammate Danilo Petrucci is currently out of Q2 due to being narrowly outpaced by the Suzukis of Joan Mir other Alex Rins in ninth and 10th.
KTM struggled in the session with the injured Pol Espargaro leading the team’s efforts in 15th, while Marquez’s works Honda teammate George Lorenzo was 20th, 1.5s off the pace.
Tech 3 KTM’s Miguel Oliveira fell at Turn 11, his second crash of the weekend.