Luca Marini fired himself to the peak of the timesheets in FP2 for the Valencia Grand Prix, the VR46 ace heading an all Ducati top three.
The Italian showed blinding speed throughout the session as he heads into the final race of the year seeking a maiden premier class rostrum result, Marini posting a 1:31.110s at the mid-point of the test to snatch away the top spot from title contender Fabio Quartararo.
His time was obliterated by a flying Jack Miller on his factory Ducati though, the Aussie putting in a 1:30.608s – though Marini wasn’t quite finished and managed to string together a commanding 1:30.217s at the death to move back to the head of the times.
His effort would ultimately leave him 0.105s clear of Pramac Ducati’s Jorge Martin as the Spaniard improved late on, while Miller also further improved his benchmark to complete a Ducati 1-2-3 at the end of Friday running.
Marc Marquez ended the day as best of the rest for Honda in fourth despite suffering a second crash of the weekend early on, the six-time premier class champion coming unstuck at Turn 1 having crashed his RC213-V at Turn 2 during the opening outing of the weekend.
Enea Bastianini completed the top five on his Gresini-prepared Desmosedici ahead of Miguel Oliveira’s KTM and Johann Zarco’s Ducati, while FP1 leader Quartararo could manage only eighth in the afternoon as he continually lost time on the long run to the line.
Francesco Bagnaia ended up ninth following a rather messy session that saw him run wide on several occasions as he looks to wrap up the 2022 riders crown, with Brad Binder finishing out the top ten on the other factory KTM.
Suzuki endured a trickier afternoon outing having looked speedy during FP1 with Alex Rins only 11th and Joan Mir 14th, while Aprilia also lacked speed with Maverick Vinales and Aleix Espargaro ending up as the filling in a Suzuki sandwich in 12th and 13th respectively – the latter going down at Turn 5 during the test.
Marco Bezzecchi ended FP2 as the highest-placed rookie in 15th for VR46 Ducati ahead of Franco Morbidelli’s Yamaha, the 2020 MotoGP vice-champion crashing at Turn 1 at the start of the session for his troubles.
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