Submitted by Jacob Leech on
Championship leader Marc Marquez has continued his scintillating 2014 form to head the opening MotoGP practice session of the Italian Grand Prix at Mugello. Lingering cloud created cool morning conditions and meant that the Spaniard's benchmark time of 1:48.004 was almost a second slower than the fastest ever lap recorded at the circuit. The time was however good enough to place him almost four tenths clear of hometown hero Valentino Rossi in second while fellow Italian riders Andrea Iannone and Andrea Dovizioso claimed impressive third and fourth placings for Ducati.
Jorge Lorenzo rounded out the top five ahead of Forward Racing's Aleix Espargaro, Stefan Bradl and Cal Crutchlow while Alvaro Bautista, who was running high up the order in the early stages, suffered a familiar crash late on to end the session in ninth place. Bradley Smith completed the top ten while his team mate Pol Espargaro had a big crash halfway through the session, he thankfully managed to walk away unscathed and finished twelfth behind an ominously under-whelming Dani Pedrosa.
Full Results:
Pos. | Num. | Rider | Bike | Time | Diff | Diff Prev |
1 | 93 | Marc MARQUEZ | Honda | 1'48.004 | ||
2 | 46 | Valentino ROSSI | Yamaha | 1'48.386 | 0.382 | 0.382 |
3 | 29 | Andrea IANNONE | Ducati | 1'48.434 | 0.430 | 0.048 |
4 | 4 | Andrea DOVIZIOSO | Ducati | 1'48.518 | 0.514 | 0.084 |
5 | 99 | Jorge LORENZO | Yamaha | 1'48.665 | 0.661 | 0.147 |
6 | 41 | Aleix ESPARGARO | Forward Yamaha | 1'48.743 | 0.739 | 0.078 |
7 | 6 | Stefan BRADL | Honda | 1'48.925 | 0.921 | 0.182 |
8 | 35 | Cal CRUTCHLOW | Ducati | 1'48.980 | 0.976 | 0.055 |
9 | 19 | Alvaro BAUTISTA | Honda | 1'49.030 | 1.026 | 0.050 |
10 | 38 | Bradley SMITH | Yamaha | 1'49.030 | 1.026 | |
11 | 26 | Dani PEDROSA | Honda | 1'49.203 | 1.199 | 0.173 |
12 | 44 | Pol ESPARGARO | Yamaha | 1'49.308 | 1.304 | 0.105 |
13 | 5 | Colin EDWARDS | Forward Yamaha | 1'49.818 | 1.814 | 0.510 |
14 | 51 | Michele PIRRO | Ducati | 1'50.030 | 2.026 | 0.212 |
15 | 7 | Hiroshi AOYAMA | Honda | 1'50.143 | 2.139 | 0.113 |
16 | 68 | Yonny HERNANDEZ | Ducati | 1'50.189 | 2.185 | 0.046 |
17 | 17 | Karel ABRAHAM | Honda | 1'50.327 | 2.323 | 0.138 |
18 | 45 | Scott REDDING | Honda | 1'50.440 | 2.436 | 0.113 |
19 | 8 | Hector BARBERA | Avintia | 1'51.396 | 3.392 | 0.956 |
20 | 63 | Mike DI MEGLIO | Avintia | 1'52.164 | 4.160 | 0.768 |
21 | 70 | Michael LAVERTY | PBM | 1'52.748 | 4.744 | 0.584 |
22 | 23 | Broc PARKES | PBM | 1'53.775 | 5.771 | 1.027 |
23 | 69 | Nicky HAYDEN | Honda | 1'55.369 | 7.365 | 1.594 |
9 | Danilo PETRUCCI |
Comments
How's that rear wheel trick working, Pol?
... and can your team get the bike fixed for FP2?
Seriously, I am uncomfortable with him rushing back out on backup bike, hearing his post-session comments that he was dazed, confused, not able to focus.
NEWSFLASH !!!
Alvaro Bautista has left orbit and returned to Earth. Very glad the boy was not injured.
Alvaro "torpedo" Bautista
Superbikeplanet.com has some nice lift-off , orbit, and re-entry photos of Bautista! :)
Love Soup's captions on the Bautista series
Nobody else does photo captions as funny as Superbikeplanet.com