– With the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, MotoGP returns from the summer break this weekend. Under sunny and optimal conditions, the first free practice session took place.
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With a time of 1:58.692 minutes, Alex Marquez (Gresini-Ducati) set the best time. With this lap time, he was already two tenths of a second under the best race lap. Last year, the Spaniard won the sprint.
With a gap of 0.173 seconds, last year’s winner Marco Bezzecchi followed in second place. The Aprilia rider returned after surgery on his broken left collarbone, which he fractured at the Sachsenring.
Pedro Acosta finished the first practice in third place. However, the session did not go smoothly for the KTM rider. After 25 minutes, Acosta crashed in the Stowe corner. It was the only incident of the session.
Raul Fernandez, whose contract with Trackhouse-Aprilia was extended, followed in fourth. Fabio Di Giannantonio (VR46-Ducati) completed the top 5. He returned to the 2024 aerodynamic package.
Marc Marquez (Ducati) was just half a second behind and took sixth place. Ai Ogura (Trackhouse-Aprilia), who finished the first half of the season as the world championship runner-up, posted the seventh fastest time.
The top 10 were completed by Jorge Martin (Aprilia), Franco Morbidelli (VR46-Ducati), and Francesco Bagnaia (Ducati). The best Honda rider was Joan Mir in eleventh place. His gap was one second (to the result).
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The fastest Yamaha lost 1.3 seconds to the top on this long and fast track. Fabio Quartararo finished 15th. This weekend, Yamaha test rider Augusto Fernandez is also competing with a wildcard.
The slowest rider in the first practice was rookie Toprak Razgatlioglu (Pramac-Yamaha), who was 2.3 seconds behind. He knows Silverstone from the Red Bull Rookies Cup in 2013 and 2014.
In Silverstone, in addition to Cal Crutchlow (LCR-Honda), two other substitute riders are present. Iker Lecuona is replacing Fermin Aldeguer in the Gresini team, who is still recovering from a vertebral fracture suffered in Assen.
At Tech3-KTM, Pol Espargaro is replacing Maverick Vinales, whose left shoulder is still not healed. On Friday, Tech3 team boss Günther Steiner emphasized that Vinales is not fired and will return as soon as he is fit.
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The afternoon practice starts at 17:00 CEST. Then it will be decided which ten riders qualify directly for Q2.
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