With beautiful sunshine beating down all day on the Misano circuit, Cal Crutchlow made a solid start to practice for this weekend’s San Marino and Rimini Riviera Grand Prix. The British rider is the man in form in the MotoGP World Championship, and backed up his recent performances with the seventh-fastest time overall in the two Friday free practice sessions. The LCR Honda man was fearful before work began that the tight Italian track wouldn’t suit his Castrol branded Honda RC213V, but showed that with the work he and the team have done throughout the season he can still challenge for the top positions. He suffered a minor crash halfway through the second section at the slowest corner on the track, but came back to post his best lap and finish the day seven-tenths down on the top time.

Cal Crutchlow:
“Today wasn’t so bad to be honest, we worked hard with the setting of the bike and we tried both the medium front and the new harder option. I didn’t have a great feeling with either really, but the bike is still working ok. We’re happy enough with certain things on the bike, but not so happy in other areas which is where we need to work. I had a really strange, small crash which having looked at the data we know why. It’s something typical of this year’s Honda, overheating the front tyre under braking and being unable to turn the bike. I’m looking forward to tomorrow, there’s still lots of work to be done, but I think we can do a good job this weekend now.”

Result FP2:

Source: motogp.com, lcr.mc