Espargaro leaves it late to deny Vinales, Bagnaia and Quartararo in Q1

There were early dramas for Joan Mir as the Repsol Honda rider ran wide at turn one and covered his tyres in gravel.

Mir, who cut a frustrated figure in Practice 1 following another mistake at turn two, was 17th quickest after ten minutes of Practice 2, one position behind Honda test rider Stefan Bradl. 

• Spanish MotoGP, Jerez - Friday Practice Results (2) 
• MotoGP riders furious over tyre pressure rule, will make it “more risky, boring”

With conditions much warmer than this morning, lap times were a considerable way off Dani Pedrosa’s time of 1:36.770s. 

After no crashes in Practice 1, Iker Lecuona was the first rider to come unstuck as he crashed at turn 13. 

While Pedrosa remained quickest on combined times, full-time factory KTM rider Brad Binder, who finished sixth in P1, was still without a time after a quarter of the session gone. 

Narrowly avoiding crashes at turns one and two, Mir eventually went down after losing the front-end of his RC213V at turn six. 

With race runs continuing to dominate P2, a red flag then halted the on-track action as the air fence at the final corner was damaged due to Lecuona’s early fall. 

The red flag was only brief however, as Maverick Vinales was the first rider to head out of pit lane. 

Showing promising speed again after a solid P1 performance, Aleix Espargaro resumed P2 by taking over top spot before finding even more time on his next lap.

Marco Bezzecchi’s P2 session was majorly hampered by a big blow up on the run towards turn six. Smoke was seen coming out of the Ducati rider’s GP22 machine before the series leader pulled off the circuit and handed his bike to marshals.

Still not himself after making his return from injury, Bastianini was down in 21st place with 20 minutes to go as he struggled to put several laps together. 

With 15 minutes to go, the opening flurry of time attacks began with Mir and Fabio Di Giannantonio finding time, although not enough to worry the top ten. 

Vinales, who was untouchable in sector four during P1, found time again on his initial run as he jumped up to third.  

In desperate need of improvements after struggling on his first run, Quartararo was again finding it tough on run #2 as he only moved up three places to go 13th. 

A rider who ruled himself out of top ten contention was Alex Rins, as the American MotoGP winner crashed at turn six.