Franco Morbidelli tops Teruel MotoGP FP3 as Ducati struggles continue

Franco Morbidelli lifted himself back to the head of the timesheets in third free practice for the Teruel MotoGP, the Italian overcoming a difficult Friday to bounce into contention by edging out Takaaki Nakagami.

The Italian found himself a lowly 15th on the overall timesheets after Friday’s second practice session but with a quicker circuit greeting the riders this morning, the San Marino MotoGP winner was back on form to produce a 1m 47.333s lap.

That was enough to unseat Honda’s Nakagami, the Japanese rider improving his Friday benchmark by three tenths of a second but just falling short of retaining his overnight lead.

Fabio Quartararo made it two Petronas SRT Yamahas inside the top three, while Maverick Vinales added his M1 into the mix in fourth position.

Alex Marquez continued his eye-catching form on the Repsol Honda to make it through to Q2 directly for the second weekend in succession, while Iker Lecuona cut a surprise figure in the upper echelons of the order with a charge to sixth fastest for Tech 3 KTM.

Aragon MotoGP race winner Alex Rins turned in the seventh best lap, with Miguel Oliveira also making large gains to join team-mate Lecuona in the latter qualifying session. Cal Crutchlow sneaked through with ninth quickest, while championship Joan Mir just squeezed through into Q2 with tenth.

Though they improved over Friday, Ducati once again saw all six of its bikes outside the top ten with Jack Miller just missing out in 11th place, while title contender Andrea Dovizioso could only manage 14th best despite making large gains on his best lap time over FP2.

He will be joined by fellow Ducati riders Tito Rabat, Danilo Petrucci, Pecco Bagnaia and Johann Zarco, the latter plum last in 21st after suffering a tumble in the closing  stages.