World Championship leader Manuel Gonzalez (Liqui Moly Dynavolt Intact GP) hit the ground running in Termas de Rio Hondo as the Spaniard ends Moto2 Practice at the top of the Triumph-powered timesheets. Gonzalez’s 1:41.713 was 0.160s quicker than Alonso Lopez‘s (Team HDR Heidrun) best time, but it was the 21’s crash on the exit of Turn 3 that signalled the premature end to Practice with a Red Flag. Just over one minute was left unused on the clock, but Lopez was all OK after the crash. Jake Dixon (ELF Marc VDS Racing Team) rounds out the top three.
Marcos Ramirez (OnlyFans American Racing) and Barry Baltus (Fantic Racing) ease into Q2 on after pocketing P4 and P5, with Aron Canet (Fantic Racing) in P6 – but that wasn’t the story of the session for the 44. In the closing stages, Canet suffered a big crash at Turn 11 but has been confirmed as fit for the remainder of the event.
There was drama for another key names too as Diogo Moreira (Italtrans Racing Team) suffered a dramatic fall at Turn 1, missing the remainder of the session and thus finding himself in P15 and heading through Q1. He’ll be looking to make short work of that on Saturday as an interesting set of names get ready to fight it out.
Check out FP2 and then get ready as Saturday’s qualifying ignites from 13:45 (UTC-3)!