Submitted by David Emmett on
Dani Pedrosa has topped the timesheets in the first session of free practice for the MotoGP class at Le Mans. The Repsol Honda man was strong throughout practice, and held off a late challenge from Jorge Lorenzo to take first blood in France. Lorenzo was not far off, however: on his final lap, he got to within four hundredths of Pedrosa's time, setting the scene for a very close weekend.
Valentino Rossi also had a strong start, taking third spot behind his Yamaha Factory teammate, three tenths off the time of Pedrosa and ahead of a pair of Ducatis, Nicky Hayden grabbing fourth while Andrea Dovizioso secured fifth. Cal Crutchlow ended the session in sixth place, ahead of Marc Marquez, who is still learning his way around the track on a MotoGP bike. The two satellite Honda riders follow in eighth and ninth, Alvaro Bautista a couple of tenths quicker than Stefan Bradl, while Hector Barbera made his way into the top ten to grab the final spot in the provisional line up for QP2.
The new qualifying format is likely to be important at Le Mans. With rain expected later on Friday and on Saturday, it will be crucial to get fast times in early. This realization had filtered its way through to the teams, as the riders went on a late charge in FP1 to try to put in a 'banker' lap, a lap which will secure them a spot on QP2 if the rain makes the rest of the sessions wet.
Results:
Pos | No. | Rider | Bike | Time | Diff | Diff Previous |
1 | 26 | Dani Pedrosa | Honda | 1'34.645 | ||
2 | 99 | Jorge Lorenzo | Yamaha | 1'34.685 | 0.040 | 0.040 |
3 | 46 | Valentino Rossi | Yamaha | 1'34.938 | 0.293 | 0.253 |
4 | 69 | Nicky Hayden | Ducati | 1'34.972 | 0.327 | 0.034 |
5 | 4 | Andrea Dovizioso | Ducati | 1'35.072 | 0.427 | 0.100 |
6 | 35 | Cal Crutchlow | Yamaha | 1'35.149 | 0.504 | 0.077 |
7 | 93 | Marc Marquez | Honda | 1'35.170 | 0.525 | 0.021 |
8 | 19 | Alvaro Bautista | Honda | 1'35.285 | 0.640 | 0.115 |
9 | 6 | Stefan Bradl | Honda | 1'35.478 | 0.833 | 0.193 |
10 | 8 | Hector Barbera | FTR Kawasaki | 1'35.949 | 1.304 | 0.471 |
11 | 41 | Aleix Espargaro | Aprilia ART | 1'36.083 | 1.438 | 0.134 |
12 | 29 | Andrea Iannone | Ducati | 1'36.211 | 1.566 | 0.128 |
13 | 51 | Michele Pirro | Ducati | 1'36.607 | 1.962 | 0.396 |
14 | 14 | Randy de Puniet | Aprilia ART | 1'36.745 | 2.100 | 0.138 |
15 | 38 | Bradley Smith | Yamaha | 1'36.790 | 2.145 | 0.045 |
16 | 7 | Hiroshi Aoyama | FTR Kawasaki | 1'36.872 | 2.227 | 0.082 |
17 | 71 | Claudio Corti | FTR Kawasaki | 1'37.325 | 2.680 | 0.453 |
18 | 5 | Colin Edwards | FTR Kawasaki | 1'37.431 | 2.786 | 0.106 |
19 | 68 | Yonny Hernandez | Aprilia ART | 1'37.597 | 2.952 | 0.166 |
20 | 9 | Danilo Petrucci | Suter BMW | 1'37.620 | 2.975 | 0.023 |
21 | 17 | Karel Abraham | Aprilia ART | 1'38.209 | 3.564 | 0.589 |
22 | 67 | Bryan Staring | FTR Honda | 1'38.516 | 3.871 | 0.307 |
23 | 70 | Michael Laverty | PBM | 1'39.325 | 4.680 | 0.809 |
24 | 52 | Lukas Pesek | Suter BMW | 1'39.710 | 5.065 | 0.385 |
Comments
69/4
as he's not there that often, I'm sure he would appreciate being posted as well as being mentioned in the text!
Hayden
... is back. Fixed a formatting error in the results table...
Rossi
3 tenths behind......a common number so far this year :O(
Hope he finds a little more...
4th Round
Being just the forth round, I have no doubt that he will find those.
Not sure...
Honestly, I doubt that will happen. If anything, Rossi and team might just go backwards as the others find more pace. I'm not being critical here, but I suspect that's the pattern we've been seeing.
Ducati
Good to see them in the mix. Very respectable times. I wonder what's different this round, the gap to the other two would seem as if they're not all "factory" bikes anymore. Lets hope that it positive change for them and not just a fluke.
If Ducati can make
If Ducati can make improvements like everyone else will (weather permitting) and keep pace then that will be something. If they're a second or more down after Qualifying, then really there's no change to anything.
Unhook the plow Colin
Five CRTs, a rookie and a test rider are in front of you. Please try a little.