Sepang MotoGP testing: Quartararo tops day one as Vinales crashes – MotoGP

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Petronas SRT rider Fabio Quartararo topped the first day of 2020 MotoGP pre-season testing in Malaysia, while his factory Yamaha counterpart Maverick Vinales crashed.

Last season’s top rookie Quartararo was the first out on track at Sepang on Friday morning, though it was Aprilia’s Aleix Espargaro who set the initial pace in the opening hour.

Espargaro, who took part in the shakedown earlier in the week, guided his radically redesigned RS-GP to a time of 1m59.427s to dip underneath the existing race lap record.

The outright lap record of 1m58.303s belongs to Quartararo, who posted that on his way to pole for last year’s Malaysian Grand Prix.

After two hours, the SRT rider put his 2019-spec M1 top of the pile with a 1m58.945s, which would ultimately go unchallenged.

Quartararo will ride the full 2020-spec M1 on Saturday, but will have just one of those at his disposal.

The morning running was briefly halted by a red flag for an incident involving one of the Yamaha test riders, though a greater lull would follow later in the day as a burst of rain kept the track quiet for some time.

Another shower late on brought running the day to a premature end with just under 10 minutes to go.

The Pramac Ducati pairing of Francesco Bagnaia and Jack Miller signalled the resumption of running with just under two hours to go, though Quartararo’s benchmark remained intact.

Quartararo’s team-mate Franco Morbidelli trailed him heading into the lunch break by 0.051 seconds, and held onto second place come the chequered flag.

Morbidelli will not have machine parity with Quartararo or the works team Yamaha riders anymore this year, and is instead riding the ‘A-spec’ M1 – essentially, the bike the factory Yamaha riders finished last November’s tests with.

Alex Rins led the Suzuki charge in third spot as he worked through his programme on the new-spec GSX-RR, while LCR’s Cal Crutchlow was top Honda rider in fourth ahead of Miller.

Vinales ended the day sixth spot, having crashed earlier in the day at the Turn 11 right-hander.

He, along with team-mate Valentino Rossi – who was 10th fastest – had three M1s at his disposal: two 2020-spec machines, and the ‘A-spec’ bike from November.

Early pacesetter Espargaro was seventh ahead of his KTM-mounted brother Pol, who also took part in the shakedown earlier this week.

Joan Mir was ninth on the sister Suzuki, with Rossi rounding out the top 10 ahead of the first of the works team Ducatis of Andrea Dovizioso.

Reigning world champion Marc Marquez shadowed Dovizioso, as he marks his first MotoGP outing since undergoing surgery on a right shoulder injury in the winter.

Admitting ahead of the test he’d only be at “70%” strength, Marquez only completed 37 laps and managed a best time of 1m59.675s.

His brother and new team-mate Alex was just a further 0.021s adrift in 13th, while Johann Zarco was 1.5s off the pace in 19th on his first outing on the Avintia Ducati GP19.

Sepang day one times

Pos Driver Team Bike Gap Laps
1 Fabio Quartararo Petronas Yamaha Yamaha 1m58.945s 52
2 Franco Morbidelli Petronas Yamaha Yamaha 0.051s 62
3 Alex Rins Suzuki Suzuki 0.250s 56
4 Cal Crutchlow LCR Honda Honda 0.289s 39
5 Jack Miller Pramac Ducati Ducati 0.291s 47
6 Maverick Vinales Yamaha Yamaha 0.422s 49
7 Aleix Espargaro Aprilia Aprilia 0.482s 43
8 Pol Espargaro KTM KTM 0.591s 48
9 Joan Mir Suzuki Suzuki 0.623s 51
10 Valentino Rossi Yamaha Yamaha 0.624s 48
11 Andrea Dovizioso Ducati Ducati 0.721s 35
12 Marc Marquez Honda Honda 0.731s 37
13 Alex Marquez Honda Honda 0.973s 38
14 Danilo Petrucci Ducati Ducati 0.994s 42
15 Dani Pedrosa KTM KTM 1.072s 45
16 Miguel Oliveira KTM KTM 1.186s 49
17 Francesco Bagnaia Pramac Ducati Ducati 1.191s 53
18 Sylvain Guintoli Suzuki Suzuki 1.426s 48
19 Johann Zarco Avintia Ducati Ducati 1.519s 54
20 Iker Lecuona KTM KTM 1.566s 44
21 Brad Binder KTM KTM 1.574s 58
22 Tito Rabat Avintia Ducati Ducati 1.805s 54
23 Takaaki Nakagami LCR Honda Honda 1.870s 31
24 ? Yamaha Yamaha 2.135s 50
25 ? Yamaha Yamaha 2.799s 22
26 Lorenzo Savadori Aprilia Aprilia 4.205s 31



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