Viñales, Lorenzo and Luthi lead the FP3 at Mugello

The third free practice sessions of the World Motorcycle Championship at the Mugello Circuit have left Maverick Viñales with the best lap time in Moto3, Jorge Lorenzo as the fastest in MotoGP and Thomas Luthi as the quickest in Moto2.

The first riders out on track were the men of the Moto3 World Championship, with our Maverick Viñales being the fastest after 45 minutes, setting a time of 1:58.530 and leaving his closest rival, Danny Kent, 0.146s behind. Meanwhile, closing out the top three was Niccolò Antonelli, 0.506s back, so the 25 is very strong and eager to keep dominating on the Mugello track.

Closing out the top ten positions: Sandro Cortese 4th, Jakub Kornfeil 5th, Louis Rossi 6th, Álex Rins 7, Romano Fenati 8th, Efrén Vázquez 9th and Brad Binder 10th. As for the rest of the Spanish riders, we saw Alberto Moncayo 11th, Héctor Faubel 20th, Luis Salom 22nd, Isaac Viñales 28th, Adrián Martín 29th and Iván Moreno 32nd.

In MotoGP, the dominance went to Jorge Lorenzo. The Mallorcan put in spectacular free practice, with the Yamaha and the 99 going all out from the start, setting fastest lap after fastest lap and lowering yesterday’s times in just three laps, undoubtedly a lot of pace for the championship leader.

Lorenzo managed to set a time of 1’47.584, dominating until the end of the practice session, with a breathtaking lap-by-lap performance. Behind him, the only man who seems able to challenge the 99 stayed very close: Dani Pedrosa. The two Spaniards finished very close together, as the Catalan ended the day just 0.095s off Lorenzo’s time, though with less pace over the laps.

Behind them, Casey Stoner placed 3rd but more than two tenths behind the two Spaniards, followed by Ben Spies 4th and Andrea Dovizioso 5th. Meanwhile, the top ten was completed by Crutchlow 6th, Hayden 7th, Barberá 8th, Bradl 9th and Rossi 10th. The best Ducati was that of the 69, while Rossi and his new helmet made it into the top ten but were unable to get past his teammate.

The rest of the Spanish riders placed Espargaró 11th, followed by Bautista 12th and Silva 14th. The pace of our riders is very interesting, especially Aleix’s with Aspar’s CRT, as he finished 1.6s behind Lorenzo and very close to the first factory bike, Rossi’s, so that’s interesting. A good day for Silva too, not so much for Bautista, who went down again and is having a lot of problems with the Honda at Mugello.

The Moto2 category was marked by the crash between Johann Zarco and Pol Espargaró. The Frenchman entered a corner too hot and collided with the Sito Pons rider, who also seemed to hurt the same right ankle he had injured at Catalunya. So it was a bad day for Espargaró, who had been showing great strength at this Italian round, and things have become complicated for him again.

Regarding the lap times, the fastest was Thomas Luthi with a 1:52.795 set in the final moments of the session, leaving behind Marc Márquez, who had dominated the entire session and settled for 2nd place in FP3, just 0.072s away.

For his part, the top ten was Andrea Iannone 3rd, Smith 4th, Corsi 5th, Corti 6th, Redding 7th, Nakagami 8th, De Angelis 9th and Espargaró 10th, despite the crash. The rest of the Spanish riders placed Nico Terol 13th, Ricky Cardús 14th, Tito Rabat 18th, Axel Pons 20th, Julián Simón 21st, Toni Elías 27th and Elena Rosell 33rd. Nico’s and Ricky’s progress is very interesting, the rest with problems at Mugello.