Submitted by David Emmett on
Marc Marquez leads the way at the end of the first session of free practice for the MotoGP class, the reigning world champion starting his 2015 season where he left off in 2014.
Marquez came out of the gate fast, setting his best time with his second flying lap, only for him to see 1st place taken from him by his Repsol Honda teammmate, Dani Pedrosa. Pedrosa led the session for the first 15 minutes, until Marquez came back out and snatched the lead. From that point, the dominion of the two Hondas went unchallenged.
Jorge Lorenzo had sat in 3rd for much of the opening session, but was demoted by Aleix Espargaro at the end, after the Suzuki rider put in a soft tire to set a time. Despite that, Espargaro's pace on the Suzuki was strong, even on the medium race tire, staying well inside the top ten. Cal Crutchlow put in a late fast lap to jump up to 5th, behind the Movistar Yamaha of Lorenzo, staying just ahead of Danilo Petrucci, who had put a soft tire on the Pramac Ducati at the end of the session to take 6th. It had been hard work, as Petrucci had had to sprint back to his pit box after his first bike cut out in pit lane.
Andrea Dovizioso was the first of the factory Ducatis in 7th, both he and Iannone focusing on race set up, and usig the medium tire. He kept ahead of Yonny Hernandez on the second Pramac Ducati, the Colombian also using the soft tire to good effect. The fast Pramacs left Valentino Rossi down in 9th, nearly nine tenths slower than Marc Marquez. Andrea Iannone rounded out the top ten.
Results:
| Pos | No | Rider | Bike | Time | Diff | Prev |
| 1 | 93 | Marc Marquez | Honda | 1'55.281 | ||
| 2 | 26 | Dani Pedrosa | Honda | 1'55.357 | 0.076 | 0.076 |
| 3 | 41 | Aleix Espargaro | Suzuki | 1'55.685 | 0.404 | 0.328 |
| 4 | 99 | Jorge Lorenzo | Yamaha | 1'55.698 | 0.417 | 0.013 |
| 5 | 35 | Cal Crutchlow | Honda | 1'55.818 | 0.537 | 0.120 |
| 6 | 9 | Danilo Petrucci | Ducati | 1'55.939 | 0.658 | 0.121 |
| 7 | 4 | Andrea Dovizioso | Ducati | 1'55.980 | 0.699 | 0.041 |
| 8 | 68 | Yonny Hernandez | Ducati | 1'56.139 | 0.858 | 0.159 |
| 9 | 46 | Valentino Rossi | Yamaha | 1'56.162 | 0.881 | 0.023 |
| 10 | 29 | Andrea Iannone | Ducati | 1'56.315 | 1.034 | 0.153 |
| 11 | 44 | Pol Espargaro | Yamaha | 1'56.361 | 1.080 | 0.046 |
| 12 | 45 | Scott Redding | Honda | 1'56.374 | 1.093 | 0.013 |
| 13 | 38 | Bradley Smith | Yamaha | 1'56.428 | 1.147 | 0.054 |
| 14 | 6 | Stefan Bradl | Yamaha Forward | 1'56.577 | 1.296 | 0.149 |
| 15 | 17 | Karel Abraham | Honda | 1'56.651 | 1.370 | 0.074 |
| 16 | 15 | Alex De Angelis | ART | 1'56.768 | 1.487 | 0.117 |
| 17 | 25 | Maverick Viñales | Suzuki | 1'56.922 | 1.641 | 0.154 |
| 18 | 8 | Hector Barbera | Ducati | 1'56.957 | 1.676 | 0.035 |
| 19 | 43 | Jack Miller | Honda | 1'56.983 | 1.702 | 0.026 |
| 20 | 76 | Loris Baz | Yamaha Forward | 1'57.031 | 1.750 | 0.048 |
| 21 | 69 | Nicky Hayden | Honda | 1'57.052 | 1.771 | 0.021 |
| 22 | 19 | Alvaro Bautista | Aprilia | 1'57.130 | 1.849 | 0.078 |
| 23 | 50 | Eugene Laverty | Honda | 1'57.224 | 1.943 | 0.094 |
| 24 | 63 | Mike Di Meglio | Ducati | 1'57.612 | 2.331 | 0.388 |
| 25 | 33 | Marco Melandri | Aprilia | 1'59.579 | 4.298 | 1.967 |
Comments
Aleix Espargaro
Any confirmation if he set that time of supersofts tires or not? The Suzuki looks to be around 15kph off the factory Honda and 8-10 kph off the factory Yamaha, which isn't a massive handicap, I think.
motogp tires 2015
for 2015 motogp, there are a total of 3 tire choices: hard, medium or soft from bridgestone.
-Factory Option teams can use hard or medium.
-Open class teams can use medium or soft.
-Factory Option concessions teams can use either medium/soft or hard/medium depending on if the factory scores three wins.
Suzuki can, at this point in time, use either the medium or the soft. The article reports "the Suzuki rider put in a soft tire to set a time".
I am aware of the tire rules
However, at the time of my comment, the article only had the timings with no accompanying text.
confusing....
Movistar yamaha is already using seamless downshifts and can brake later than last year, despite that their top speeds have not improved from last year. Not to mention they are using a powerful engine this year. In contrast tech3 boys are extracting 7km/hr more from their bikes.
Well the gap to honda's have remained more or less the same. Yamaha needs to extract the max from their gearbox combined with a good setup to slash off tenths from their time or else it will be difficult to fight for the victory.
Melandri...
I know Marco hasn't been particularly impressive in testing, but I'm still pretty shocked that he's almost two and a half seconds slower than his team-mate. I'm getting less and less convinced that Melandri will still be employed by the end of the year. Hopefully he can find his way into the Red Devils squad sooner rather than later.
Michelins
I thought the reason they were leaving him circulating at the back this year was because he had experience riding on Michelins. This year seems to be a bust for him before he even starts.
Nicky
What's going on....the only north american is at the bottom :(
The former champ isn't fighting for podiums anymore, maybe not even for points, is he "Melandried"?
Interesting that the ART is 4
Interesting that the ART is 4 tenths faster than the Bautista's factory Aprillia...
De Angelis
Not just that, De Angelis is in 16th spot out of 24. Impressive. But we know that De Angelis can be brilliant at times; right now there's a lot of 'real' MotoGP bikes behind him. The ART is the only remaining bike that is basically a tuned roadbike engine in another chassis - although the current RS-GP almost falls into this definition too.
That the ART is faster now than the factory Aprilias is not that strange. The ART is more or less fully developed and refined, while Bautista and Melandri are riding a real prototype bike in the true sense of the word. It's an early stages test bike on which they are trying to find the best base to continue development from. I can imagine they will be trying very fundamental things right now and results will vary a lot during the season, especially the early part.
That being said, I think Bautista being just 1,8 seconds behind the fastest time is actually quite close on a lap time of almost two minutes. If they are still this close at the end of this weekend, they will be very pleased, I'd think. That they are nevertheless at the bottom of the list only shows how high-level and close the whole current field is. Melandri of course is a story apart; he's obviously still looking for the right feel, not ready for chasing lap times yet.
Of course this is all just FP1...