The reigning World Champion tops FP1 and practically all of FP2. Pedrosa provisionally achieves direct access to Q2 after steady improvements.
56 thousandths of a second separated Marc Márquez from taking the best time of the day, despite leading both FP1 and FP2 until Andrea Iannone lowered his time on his final lap.
The Repsol Honda rider had a small crash at Turn 11, when there were less than 20 minutes remaining in the session.
Dani Pedrosa completed 15 laps in FP1 and another 16 laps in FP2, in which he reached third place on the timesheets. He was tenth overall and, should the weather forecast for rain prove accurate, is in a good spot for direct access to Q2.
MARC MÁRQUEZ | 2nd 2:04.655
“I’m quite happy with how things are going because I felt strong from the beginning, and we worked for the race. Most importantly, I did my lap time with a hard rear tyre. They also say it may rain tomorrow, so it’s positive to be up in second place. Our pace is already good, but there are a few things we want to improve because I don’t yet feel 100%. This afternoon I had a small crash when I tried another setup, so we need to keep working, also because there are some riders looking strong, in particular Vinales. Today we were able to try several tyres but we must also understand more on that side. Anyway, let’s wait and see; there’s so much that remains between now and Sunday.”
DANI PEDROSA | 10th 2:05.761
“I’m happy with this afternoon’s result, as we finally managed to get a bit better position than I was expecting, and this is very positive. That said, both of today’s sessions were tough, especially FP2, because this afternoon I gave maximum effort in order to understand if there’s any reason to race on Sunday. This morning I felt quite a lot of pain, but I just tried to feel what I could do on the bike. My pace wasn’t so good, so I tried to put myself in a better position this afternoon, and I’m very pleased with the outcome. Now we have to try and control the swelling ahead of tomorrow’s action. This is one of our biggest targets now, as the swelling has increased due to the efforts. We’ll try our best to handle a bit better pace tomorrow so that we may approach the race with the aim of getting some points.”
