Ducati’s Francesco Bagnaia set a new lap record on his first-time attack at the Misano circuit to top MotoGP‘s second practice session.
Bagnaia and Pramac’s Jorge Martin dominated the early stages of the practice session, trading the top spot as they pulled ahead of the chasing pack by four-tenths.
However, on his initial push, Bagnaia set a blistering 1:30.286s to break the lap record at the Misano World Circuit as he topped the timed practice session and booked his place in Q2.
Martin was also showing lightning pace and was on course to challenge the Italian, but his fastest lap was cancelled due to yellow flags after Tech3 GasGas’ Augusto Fernandez crashed ahead of him.
Martin wouldn’t go quicker than his lap of 1:30.484s after crashing out of the session with three minutes to go, as he ended up second, 0.198s off of Bagnaia’s time.
There were also late crashes for Fabio Di Giannantonio, Brad Binder and Enea Bastianini which caused many of the riders to abandon their flying laps.
Gresini’s Marc Marquez was in third, ending up 0.299s behind the championship contenders, as Bastianini was 4th, 0.321s behind teammate Bagnaia.
It was a positive showing for Yamaha’s Fabio Quartararo as he finished fifth, six-tenths off of Bagnaia’s lap record, with Pramac’s Franco Morbidelli in sixth.
VR46’s Marco Bezzecchi was seventh, as the Aprilia Maverick Vinales finished eighth.
Tech3 GasGas’ Pedro Acosta finished ninth after a crash early in the session and the Aprilia of Aleix Espargaro rounded out the top 10.
Jack Miller narrowly missed out on a Q2 spot in 11th, ahead of LCR Honda’s Johann Zarco in 12th.
VR46’s Di Giannantonio was 13th despite his late crash ahead of Gresini’s Alex Marquez in 14th and KTM’s Brad Binder in 15th.
The Trackhouse pair of Miguel Oliveira and Raul Fernandez came home in 16th and 17th, ahead of the Repsol Honda duo of Luca Marini and Joan Mir.
Augusto Fernandez was 20th after crashing out of the session, and LCR Honda’s Takaaki Nakagami rounded out the time-setters in 21st place.
Alex Rins sat out of the afternoon session due to a high fever and the Yamaha rider will be going through Q1 tomorrow morning.
