Bagnaia and Bastianini finish comfortably inside the top-10 in crash-filled free practice for the German GP at Sachsenring. Bezzecchi goes quickest in P2

Francesco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini both comfortably booked a spot for the crucial Q2 qualifying session tomorrow with fourth and eighth place respectively on the opening day of free practice for the German Grand Prix on the challenging 3.671 km Sachsenring circuit near Chemnitz.

With conditions cooler and the light rain that fell for a moment in the 45-minute P1, teams and riders struggled to find the ideal set-up, leaving most of the work until the afternoon, but further complications ensued in the one-hour session as it was twice interrupted with red and resulting yellow flags for a series of crashes in various sectors of the track.

Despite the relatively short time available, both Bagnaia and Bastianini were right on the pace, last week’s Mugello winner putting in a couple of quick laps with ten minutes remaining to move into P2 with a time of 1:20.371. Marco Bezzecchi (VR46 Racing), Jorge Martin (Pramac Racing) and Aleix Espargarò then headed him to clinch the top three places at the end of the session.

Bastianini ended practice 1 down in P17 as he continued to ease his way back to full fitness, but then made a major step forward in the afternoon. Almost replicating his teammate’s time with a lap of 1:20.657 to slot into P2 on his time attack, Enea was eventually in P8 as other riders moved ahead of him in the final minutes.

Francesco Bagnaia (#1 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 4th (1:20.371)
“Like always we were focussing on the race and we did many laps with the used tyres, the pace was good and I’m happy with the feeling. We improved all the day every session, step-by-step, and finally the time attack went well. I’m also happy with the sensation with the tyres so let’s see tomorrow morning hoping for dry conditions. Today was tough because it was difficult to find some consistency but this was the same for everybody. I was ready for any situation and really focussed on the race and the race distance with the tyres. We missed maybe being in the top 10 for many laps because we were adapting to the conditions with all the yellow flags but the work we did was impressive. I want to say that my setting suits this track well and for me it’s starting to become a good track for our bike.”

Enea Bastianini (#23 Ducati Lenovo Team) – 8th (1:20.657)
“In this track I expected it to be a bit easier to be fast because it’s less physical. This morning was difficult because I suffered a lot with the rear, but this afternoon was much better and I’m happy about my day because I am in Q2 and I did a good pace during P2. It’s very important to be in Q2 because it might rain tomorrow. I prefer the dry conditions but if it is hot it doesn’t help me so much because physically I’m not so prepared and I haven’t trained much. Probably in this track, I can be more competitive in the long race because less change of direction helps me not to suffer a lot and this track has many left corners, which is a plus. I think I can do a great race tomorrow and also Sunday I want to do a great result.”

Tomorrow’s track action for the Ducati Lenovo Team sees the third and final practice session scheduled for 10.10am local time, while Q1 and Q2 will be shortly after starting from 10:50am. The afternoon’s 15-lap Sprint will get underway at 3:00pm.