Martin sets the pace for Ducati on opening day

Last year’s championship runner-up Martin set a time of 1m57.951s on the GP24 Ducati to head Tech3 rookie Pedro Acosta by 0.269s following eight hours of running on a hot and sunny day in Malaysia.

Raul Fernandez grabbed the top spot early on for the new Trackhouse team as the test began at 10am local time, lapping the venue in 2m00.044s on his satellite Aprilia.

Drama would follow just 20 minutes into the session, as both Fernandez and Ducati’s Francesco Bagnaia went down at Turn 11 in separate incidents.

It is understood that Fernandez was the first to fall off his bike at the long right-hander, with Bagnaia then getting caught up by the oil left on track by the Aprilia.

Fernandez’s bike caught fire in the gravel trap while the Spanish rider himself had to be taken to the medical centre later for check-ups after reporting pain. He was able to rejoin the session later on.

Once the red flag deployed to assist with the recovery of their bikes was removed, Maverick Vinales started lighting up the timesheets on the factory Aprilia, breaking the two-minute barrier with a time of 1m59.639s just before the end of the first hour.

During the second hour, it was Martin who rose to the fore, setting a time of 1m58.904s before lowering the benchmark further to 1m58.201s.

Shortly after the clock ticked past 1pm, the Pramac rider managed to go even quicker with the first 1m57s lap of the session, putting himself within half a second of the fastest-ever MotoGP time set at Sepang.

The 1m57.951s flier would remain unbeaten until the end of the day’s running, with the majority of the riders shifting away from time attacks in the afternoon session.

The closest anyone came to Martin’s lap during the day was MotoGP rookie Acosta, who set a best time of 1m58.220s on his KTM to finish second.

Fabio Quartararo, whose Yamaha team struggled with one-lap pace all year in 2023, jumped to third with just two hours remaining in the session with a time that was just 0.008s slower than Acosta.

Quartararo’s late effort pushed VR46’s Fabio di Giannantonio down to fourth, 0.032s ahead of the factory Ducati of Enea Bastianini. 

Vinales led Aprilia’s charge after improving to a 1m58.470s in the final hour of the running, leaving behind the Ducatis of Alex Marquez (Gresini) and Marco Bezzecchi (VR46).

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