Rain affects first day of free practice in Mugello

The first day of free practice for the Gran Premio d’Italia TIM at Mugello was day of two halves with good weather prevailing in the morning session while this afternoon was affected by rain. The fans didn’t get much a chance to see the riders in action in FP2 with most opting to remain in the pits such was the tricky conditions so the best times came from this morning’s FP1 session.

With the first three practice sessions counting towards both Q1 and Q2, most of the riders will be hoping for better conditions tomorrow. While Michele Pirro topped the timesheets this afternoon, the Ducati Team rider’s beast time of 2m 05.435s was in stark contrast to the overall leader Marc Marquez on his Repsol Honda RC213V with the reigning MotoGP Champion and current championship leader setting a best time of 1m 48.004s this morning.

Sitting in second place is Movistar Yamaha rider Valentino Rossi who takes part in his 300th Grand Prix this weekend and the seven time MotoGP champion’s best lap was just 0.382s behind Marquez. The Italian crowds will be glad to see another two of their country men in the top five early on this weekend with Andrea Iannone in 3rd for the Pramac Racing team with a 1m 48.434s lap while Andrea Dovizioso was 0.084s behind for the Ducati Team and Jorge Lorenzo rounds off the top five for the Movistar Yamaha team with a 1m 48.665s lap.

Aleix Espargaro set the 6th best time today with a 1m 48.743s for the NGM Forward Racing team and he finished head of Germany’s Stefan Bradl who set a best lap of 1m 48.925s for the LCR Honda team. Cal Crutchlow sits in 8th after his first day at the Tuscan track for the Ducati team and the British rider will look to improve on today’s best time 1m 48.980s with the Ducatisti looking on. The 9th place rider today was Alvaro Bautista for the GO&Fun Honda Gresini team with a best lap of 1m 49.030s while setting the 10th best lap was Monster Yamaha Tech 3’s Bradley Smith with a 1m 49.030s lap.