Buriram WSBK: Van der Mark scores maiden pole

The 23-year-old became the first Honda rider to top qualifying since Jonathan Rea at Imola in 2014.

Van der Mark led the way in the early stages of the second Superpole session and was the last to improve in the dying minutes.

He stole the lead from Tom Sykes with his penultimate effort and, while the Briton failed to improve on his final lap, Van der Mark went even quicker to claim the pole by two tenths.

Sykes had to settle for third, having been beaten by Jonathan Rea as well, the Kawasaki teammates setting identical times.

Having been the leader after the mid-session pit stops, Ducati's Chaz Davies eventually dropped back to fourth, followed by Sylvain Guintoli (Yamaha) and Davide Giugliano (Ducati).

The second Yamaha of Alex Lowes took seventh, narrowly edging out Nicky Hayden (Honda), as the top 10 was completed by the Althea BMWs of Markus Reiterberger and Jordi Torres.

Superpole 2 Times:

Pos	Rider	Team	Bike	Time
1	Michael van der Mark	Honda World Superbike Team	Honda CBR1000RR SP	1:33.452
2	Jonathan Rea	Kawasaki Racing	Kawasaki ZX-10R	1:33.671
3	Tom Sykes	Kawasaki Racing	Kawasaki ZX-10R	1:33.671
4	Chaz Davies	Ducati Team	Ducati 1199 Panigale R	1:33.844
5	Sylvain Guintoli	Pata Yamaha Official WSBK Team	Yamaha YZF-R1	1:33.866
6	Davide Giugliano	Ducati Team	Ducati 1199 Panigale R	1:33.983
7	Alex Lowes	Pata Yamaha Official WSBK Team	Yamaha YZF-R1	1:34.371
8	Nicky Hayden	Honda World Superbike Team	Honda CBR1000RR SP	1:34.416
9	Markus Reiterberger	Althea BMW Racing Team	BMW S1000 RR	1:34.796
10	Jordi Torres	Althea BMW Racing Team	BMW S1000 RR	1:34.859
11	Karel Abraham	Milwaukee BMW	BMW S1000 RR	1:34.958
12	Matteo Baiocco	VFT Racing	Ducati 1199 Panigale R	1:35.513