Silverstone Moto2 FP1 British Grand Prix: Fabio di Giannantonio creates a surprise and breaks the record

It was with keen interest that the drivers took to the track to discover its new surface, completely redone since the cancellation of the Grand Prix last year due to bad weather. The two main questions they had were about the grip of the new surface, as well as whether there would be any bumps.

Silverstone Moto2™	2018	2019
FP1	2'08.385 Marcel Schrötter	2'05.777 Fabio di Giannantonio
FP2	2'10.452 Alex Marquez
FP3	2'08.182 Marcel Schrötter
Q1	XXX
Q2	2'08.153 Francesco Bagnaia
warm up	2'22.814 Marcel Schrötter
Course	XXX
All time lap record	2'06.345 Sam Lowes (2015)

At the start of the session, the air temperature was 19° and the track temperature was 26°. The sky was cloudy in places, but no showers were forecast by the weather forecast. At Petronas, Bradley Smith replaced Khairul Idham Pawi.

The first significant time was achieved by Sam Lowes in 2'08.596. Sam has been the test record holder since 2015 in 2'06.345.

Lowes improved shortly after to 2'07.200, 0.093 ahead of Tom Lüthi. Bradley Smith set off more cautiously when he discovered his Kalex.

Half an hour from the checkered flag, Tom Luthi took the lead in 2'06.401, 0.4 ahead of Sam Lowes and 0.6 ahead Alex Marquez.

Jorge Navarro, third in the Championship, climbed into third position in 2'07.070. Remy Gardner came second, 0.3 behind the Swiss leader. NAVARRO progressed again and became second on his Speed ​​Up, 0.029 behind Tom Luthi.

With 24 minutes to go, Brad Binder and KTM took the lead with a time of 2'06.380. Then Mattia Pasini took command in 2'06.197, new record at the Silverstone circuit in Moto2.

At mid-session, the differences were small, with Pasini preceding by 0.1 Binder and Lüthi, and by 0.2 Gardner, Márquez, Navarro, di Giannantonio and Lowes.

The session calmed down a little with a quarter of an hour to go, with the teams then adapting the machine settings to the new surface in the pits. With the lap record already broken, there was no doubt about its quality. The tires Dunlop were adapted to this new surface and efficient.

With 10 minutes to go, the top 17 were within a second of each other. Bradley Smith was 29th at 2.5, his bike experiencing technical problems. He finally left 6 minutes from the checkered flag.

Fabio di Giannantonio became third in 2'06.386, but he was overtaken by Alex Marquez now second in 2'06.229, 0.032 behind Pasini.

The final sprint was launched in the last three minutes, and by Giannantonio (Speed ​​Up) took first place in 2'05.777 (new record, of course) ahead of his teammate at Campetella, Jorge Navarro, followed by Lüthi, Márquez and Gardner.

Results of the first free practice session:

Reference times:

Test record: 2'06.345 by Sam Lowes (Speed ​​Up) in 2015

Lap record: 2'06.690 by Franco Morbidelli (Kalex) in 2017

Provisional ranking of the World Championship:

1 Alex MÁRQUEZ – Kalex 181 points

2 Thomas LÜTHI – Kalex 138

3 Jorge NAVARRO – Speed ​​Up 126

4 Augusto FERNÁNDEZ – Kalex 121

5 Lorenzo BALDASSARRI – Kalex 115

6 Marcel SCHRÖTTER – Kalex 114

7 Brad BINDER – KTM 109

8 Luca MARINI – Kalex 101

9 Enea BASTIANINI – Kalex 74

10 Fabio DI GIANNANTONIO – Speed ​​Up 59

11 Tetsuta NAGASHIMA – Kalex 52

12 Remy GARDNER – Kalex 44

13 Iker LECUONA – KTM 41

14 Xavi VIRGIN – Kalex 39

15 Sam LOWES – Kalex 38

16 Andrea LOCATELLI – Kalex 38

17 Nicolò BULEGA – Kalex 28

18 Mattia PASINI – Kalex 24

19 Jorge MARTIN – KTM 22

20 Dominique AEGERTER – MV Agusta 12

21 Somkiat CHANTRA – Kalex 11

22 Stefano MANZI – MV Agusta 10

23 Simone CORSI – Kalex 10

24 Marco BEZZECCHI – KTM 10

25 Bo BENDSNEYDER – NTS 6

26 Jake DIXON – KTM 4

27 Joe ROBERTS – KTM 4

28 Lukas TULOVIC – KTM 3

29 Khairul Idham PAWI – Kalex 3

30 Jesko RAFFIN – NTS 3

Photos © motogp.com / Dorna