The opening day of free practice at the Dutch Grand Prix was bathed in sunshine and LCR Honda CASTROL rider Cal Crutchlow took advantage of the fine conditions to claim fifth spot on the timesheets. The Briton arrived in Assen on the back of a consistent run of results and made an encouraging start to the weekend at the legendary TT Circuit.
He posted the ninth fastest time in the morning’s FP1 session, but shaved over a second off that mark in FP2 as he made up four places to keep pace with the leading riders. With the weather forecast set fair, Crutchlow is hopeful of further progress on Saturday as he looks to secure a positive result in qualifying.
Cal Crutchlow – 5th (1’33.812 – lap 20 of 20)
“It’s good that we’ve got consistent weather, last year we only had FP1 and FP2 to try things with the bike before it started to rain. Knowing the plan ahead is good so we can start to look towards what we’ll work on tomorrow, which I think will be to try and make the bike a little bit more stable and to try and find a little more rear grip.
“Overall today we were pleased with the pace and the performance of the bike. The bike did seem quite difficult to ride on the change of direction and we will work on it for tomorrow, but overall the lap time was not bad and the speed was there.”
Results FP2:
| Pos | Rider | Team | Fastest lap |
| 1 | Maverick VIÑALES | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP | 1’33.378 |
| 2 | Andrea IANNONE | Team SUZUKI ECSTAR | 1’33.499 |
| 3 | Danilo PETRUCCI | Alma Pramac Racing | 1’33.764 |
| 4 | Valentino ROSSI | Movistar Yamaha MotoGP | 1’33.779 |
| 5 | Cal CRUTCHLOW | LCR Honda CASTROL | 1’33.812 |
| 6 | Andrea DOVIZIOSO | Ducati Team | 1’33.859 |
| 7 | Jorge LORENZO | Ducati Team | 1’33.870 |
| 8 | Marc MARQUEZ | Repsol Honda Team | 1’34.041 |
| 9 | Alex RINS | Team SUZUKI ECSTAR | 1’34.047 |
| 10 | Johann ZARCO | Monster Yamaha Tech 3 | 1’34.133 |
| 11 | Dani PEDROSA | Repsol Honda Team | 1’34.167 |
| 12 | Hafizh SYAHRIN | Monster Yamaha Tech 3 | 1’34.246 |
| 13 | Aleix ESPARGARO | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini | 1’34.318 |
| 14 | Alvaro BAUTISTA | Angel Nieto Team | 1’34.484 |
| 15 | Karel ABRAHAM | Angel Nieto Team | 1’34.522 |
| 16 | Jack MILLER | Alma Pramac Racing | 1’34.535 |
| 17 | Tito RABAT | Reale Avintia Racing | 1’34.576 |
| 18 | Bradley SMITH | Red Bull KTM Factory Racing | 1’34.700 |
| 19 | Pol ESPARGARO | Red Bull KTM Factory Racing | 1’34.822 |
| 20 | Takaaki NAKAGAMI | LCR Honda IDEMITSU | 1’34.855 |
| 21 | Scott REDDING | Aprilia Racing Team Gresini | 1’34.970 |
| 22 | Franco MORBIDELLI | EG 0,0 Marc VDS | 1’35.287 |
| 23 | Thomas LUTHI | EG 0,0 Marc VDS | 1’36.129 |
| 24 | Xavier SIMEON | Reale Avintia Racing | 1’36.157 |
Source: motogp.com, lcr.mc, calcrutchlow35.nl