British MotoGP: Jorge Martin makes it a Friday practice double, Marc Marquez squeezes into Q2

Jorge Martin leads the way for the second consecutive practice at Silverstone.

Jorge Martin
Jorge Martin

Second practice got off to a disastrous start for Enea Bastianini as a mechanical issue led to smoke coming from the rear of his GP24. 

It was then the turn of Marco Bezzecchi to run into issues as his GP23 also had smoke coming from it in what appeared to be an oil problem.

Moments after going second, Miguel Oliveira nearly came unstuck at turn one as he suffered a huge front-end wobble. 

Like FP1, Aleix Espargaro was the first rider to dip into the 1m 59s barrier, while Takaaki Nakagami became the first faller of the session. 

Jorge Martin then made his mark as he went close to four tenths clear of Espargaro, before Fabio Di Giannantonio close to within +0.211s of the Spaniard.

Then it was the turn of reigning world champion Francesco Bagnaia to make a statement as he went fastest by over three tenths from Maverick Vinales. 

But Bagnaia was quickly beaten by Bastianini, who put his early gremlins behind him to set a time of 1:59.026s.

Although it wasn't enough to take over top spot, Vinales was setting very competitive lap times and showed that he had the pace to trouble Bastianini and Bagnaia. 

One of the first riders to use a soft rear tyre, Pedro Acosta moved up into the top five positions as a result. 

Pushing on with a new hard front tyre, Martin was delivering very good pace as he went second despite running a used medium rear. 

Then came a sizzling lap time from Vinales as he smashed the fastest time with a mid 1m 58s effort. 

Martin then joined Vinales in the 1m 58s, however, he couldn't trouble the Aprilia rider.

Playing games in pit lane, Marc Marquez was waiting for Martin at the start of his next stint, but had to settle for Espargaro as company because Martin held back. 

After finally latching onto the rear of Martin, Marquez jumped up the order but was only seventh thanks to his latest improvement. 

Bagnaia then found two tenths late on to go top but Martin and Espargaro both had an answer as they broke into the 1m 57s barrier. 

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