“I think it’s very positive today,” reflected Viñales, who was over two tenths slower than Marquez in sector two on Friday. “Even if I didn’t feel that great on the bike because the grip level was down, I think our lap times were quite competitive. We’ve worked on race setup, trying to understand the way to go in the first laps. We tried the tyres and we know less or more the feelings for tomorrow so we can concentrate a lot on riding style, trying to improve especially sector two.”

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The 18 MotoE™ riders got a 30-minute FP1 and FP2 session under their belts on Friday, and it was Jesko Raffin (Dynavolt Intact GP) who topped the first ever competitive MotoE™ session in FP1. However, the pace was upped considerably in the afternoon with the likes of Di Meglio and Garzo going around one second quicker. Raffin could only improve his FP1 time by a tenth in FP2 as the Swiss rider finished fourth on the combined times with a 1:28.696, 0.105 quicker than fifth place Bradley Smith (One Energy Racing).

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In sector one, it’s Pramac Racing’s Jack Miller who is currently fastest. The Australian, on board his Desmosedici GP19, set the best time of 17.957 through the first split to go 0.039 quicker than Marquez, with Maverick Viñales (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP) the third-best through sector one.

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Hafizh Syahrin now using the carbon swingarm and setting the fastest KTM lap in Assen: “In Tech 3, they’ve had our level since Jerez, but since then we’ve been able to improve the bike again quite significantly, so Miguel got the swingarm last week, which helps our bike a lot. Hafizh now has one, so we decided not to fill up stock for the factory riders but just to give every single piece we could get ready out of this carbon oven, we handed it to the rider, so I think if you get it new there is some potential, like Miguel last week, there is some benefit but you have to change the setup of the bike a little bit to make it work. So, I think he will enjoy this much more this weekend and Hafizh starts now. He just did two runs on the old swingarm and the last one on the carbon. It will take time to bring all the guys to the same level, but we will keep on producing parts and bringing them to the race track.” 

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It was recently reported in the German press that Binder will make the move to the premier class next year, however, Beirer denied a deal was already in place by saying “there is no signed contract”. However, the pair continue to have talks over the possibility of Binder becoming the first South African MotoGP™ rider.

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However, the session would end in flames for Marquez after the title contender went down at Turn 3, his bike caught fire but luckily it was extinguished fairly quickly. That was Marquez’ day over but it wasn’t day over for Binder, the South African shot to the top of the times with three minutes to go by over three tenths, setting the first and what proved to be the only 1:23 of FP2. As the chequered flag came out, the Assen second place finisher would remain comfortably clear of the rest after finishing P15 in FP1, with Lecuona getting on terms with Vierge late in the session – the latter keeps P2 after setting the 1:24.328 first and improves massively on his P18 in FP1, despite a crash at Turn 1 in the second Free Practice.

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