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Ducati’s Alvaro Bautista tops Assen practice

Ducati's Alvaro Bautista tops Assen practice

Bautista set a time of 1m34.382s with just 10 minutes left on the clock in FP2, outpacing Razgatlioglu’s FP1 benchmark by just 0.082s to end the day the quickest of all.

Razgatlioglu was untouchable in the first practice session of the weekend, finishing more than four tenths clear of his nearest competitor, but couldn’t improve on his previous lap in the afternoon – and had to settle for second spot on the combined timesheets.

Rea did deliver a massive improvement in pace between the two sessions on his factory Kawasaki, but his best effort of the day still ended up three tenths shy of Bautista’s time on the Panigale V4 R.

However, Kawasaki’s day was made better by Alex Lowes roughly matching the pace of his six-time championship-winning teammate, the British rider classified a strong fourth with a time of 1m34.772s.

Iker Lecuona made it four different manufacturers in the top five after lapping the Dutch circuit in 1m34.884s, but the Honda rider’s running was hampered by major crash at Turn 3 in FP2, requiring a trip to the medical checks.

This also brought out the only red flag of the day, but the track was soon cleared to allow the session to resume after a short halt.

Lecuona himself was able to return later in the session to log some crucial laps, although he couldn’t improve on his previous effort and ended up ninth in FP2 – and fifth overall.

The top independent rider in Friday practice was GRT Yamaha’s Garrett Gerloff in sixth, the American edging out the factory Ducati of Michael Ruben Rinaldi by just 0.017s in the general classification.

Bonovo MGM rider Loris Baz again outpaced the factory BMW duo in practice, setting a time of 1m35.320s to end the day eighth-quickest ahead of Yamaha’s Andrea Locatelli and the Motocorsa Ducati of Axel Bassani.

Scott Redding finished over three tenths behind Baz in 11th on the works BMW 1000RR, with Michael van der Mark even further back on his return from injury.

Leon Haslam finished 17th and 14th…

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