MotoGP Indonesia Practice: Aprilia Roars, Crashes and Sparks, Bagnaia Returns to Q2!

The Friday of the Indonesian GP comes to a close: here’s how Practice unfolded, the most important MotoGP session today for tomorrow’s qualifying.

Aprilia arrive at Mandalika as the bike-and-rider combination to beat—every Ducati rider has said so. At least on this day, the prediction was perfectly respected: Raul Fernandez shines in Practice with a lap that rewrites the circuit record, followed by Marco Bezzecchi and Jorge Martin. The good news for Ducati is that Pecco Bagnaia finally secured direct entry to Q2 for the first time since Assen! Friday’s second session got underway late due to a technical problem that had halted the preceding Moto2 session—a fault in the race control communication and timing system. Here’s how it went.

Following what we saw in the first free practice session, it was time to secure a top-10 spot for tomorrow’s qualifying. The head-to-head battle between Ducati and Aprilia resumed, with the two manufacturers immediately monopolising most of the top positions. As always, however, the opening part of the session was devoted to adjustments and tyre testing ahead of qualifying and the races. Fabio Quartararo crashed, looking a little dazed after tumbling into the gravel but emerging unhurt, while a piece of aerodynamic bodywork was seen flying off Martin’s RS-GP. Sparks flew this time between Morbidelli and Aldeguer, with the VR46 rider held up by the Gresini man.

Bastianini also crashed later on, at the very spot where Quartararo had gone down, while a technical problem brought Aldeguer to a halt—he would later have to appear before the stewards over the incident with Morbidelli. Moreira then crashed as well, followed by Alex Marquez, Alex Rins, and Bastianini once again... It all happened in the final 15 minutes, when the assault on the top 10 for direct entry to tomorrow’s Q2 began. Raul Fernandez remained firmly at the top with a record-breaking 1:28 lap, while Bezzecchi and Martin, like everyone else, significantly improved on their FP1 times. Aprilia dominated, Bagnaia reappeared among the frontrunners, and all the key players were there.

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