Marquez was over a second clear of Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP’s Maverick Viñales, who himself was nearly four tenths ahead of Petronas Sprinta Racing’s Fabio Quartararo. Cal Crutchlow (LCR Castrol Honda) ended the session fourth quickest, with Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP’s Valentino Rossi completing the top five.
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No more rain was falling at the Twin Ring Motegi for the intermediate class qualifying sessions, but the surface was still plenty damp enough for wet Dunlops. And it soon emerged that Marini was the man to beat, the VR46 Academy rider placed himself at the top of the standings, however, Baldassarri was less than a tenth off his compatriot. Fernandez, a Championship hopeful, then put himself in between the Italians on the provisional front row to sit 0.004 off Marini. However, the latter was about to get a wriggle on.
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Although the rain had stopped falling at the Twin Ring Motegi, conditions still required maximum focus and attention. So much so that the four riders who progressed through from Q1 used the experience gained in that session to great effect. Antonelli, the Estrella Galicia 0,0 duo of Alonso Lopez and Sergio Garcia, plus Makar Yurchenko (BOE Skull Rider Mugen Race), all ended inside the top five.
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Riders such as Petrucci, teammate Andrea Dovizioso and Maverick Viñales (Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP) were slowly chipping away at Marquez’ time and on his final flying lap, Petrux went red in all three sectors to claim P1 in FP3. Behind second place Marquez and third place Morbidelli was Viñales, with Guintoli impressing in the wet conditions to finish P5. Dovizioso was just over a second off Marquez in P6, with Alex Rins (Team Suzuki Ecstar), Friday pacesetter Quartararo, Pol Espargaro (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) and Red Bull KTM Tech 3’s Miguel Oliveira split by less than a tenth in the top 10.
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Dixon, despite ending fastest, was one of 12 riders to crash out during what was an incident-filled Moto2™ session. He joined a list containing Idemitsu Honda Team Asia duo Dimas Ekky Pratama and Somkiat Chantra, Dixon’s Gaviota Angel Nieto teammate Xavi Cardelus, Sam Lowes (Federal Oil Gresini Moto2), Jorge Martin (Red Bull KTM Ajo), Philipp Oettl (Red Bull KTM Tech 3), Nicolo Bulega (SKY Racing Team VR46), Lorenzo Baldassarri (FlexBox HP40), Iker Lecuona (monday.com American Racing), Adam Norrodin (Petronas Sprinta Racing) and Bo Bendsneyder (NTS RW Racing GP).
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Rain was heavily predicted for Saturday morning and it proved to be the case, with the lightweight class heading out to get what may prove to be valuable wet track time if the inclement weather stays for qualifying. Reigning FIM CEV Repsol Moto3™ Junior World Champion Raul Fernandez (Gaviota Angel Nieto Team) was fourth quickest, with Jaume Masia (Mugen Race) completing the top five.
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For now though, Rins’ main attention is firmly on Suzuki’s home race in Japan this weekend. Sitting P11 after Friday and with Saturday looking to be wet, the Spaniard has work to do in Q1 if he’s to qualify well. FP3 begins at 10:50 local time (GMT+9), tune in to see how Rins, teammate Joan Mir and Guintoli get on ahead of qualifying.
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Fastest in every sector in the afternoon session, the Frenchman was on fire as he took to Motegi on board a premier class machine like a duck to water. And Quartararo may have to do the same, quite literally, on Saturday as the heavens are set to open on qualifying day. However, focusing his attention firstly on Friday’s action, the rookie was very pleased with how the day panned out, reiterating what he’d said in the Press Conference about ignoring how Motegi “isn’t a Yamaha track”.
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According to weather forecasts, all three FP3 sessions look set to be almost 100% wet. This means the times from Friday are set to decide who enters the respective Q2 sessions automatically, but there is some good news: the rain is meant to clear in the afternoon, meaning there could be some dry weather qualifying runs.
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Riders were very keen to get a quick lap down this afternoon when FP2 got underway at Motegi just after 1700 Friday afternoon Australian Eastern Daylight Savings Time.
The reasons for their haste were dropping track temperatures combined with looming rain clouds, and when it rains at Motegi, it really rains! The forecast for tomorrow is not all that friendly, so there is a fair chance that riders will not manage to improve on their times tomorrow which is what makes today so crucial.
It had been a Yamaha 1-2-3 in FP1 led by Maverick Vinales but the Yamaha men were not in any hurry to improve on their markers until late in the session when Vinales went under the lap record to lower the benchmark further to 1m45.085s.
There were red sectors appearing everywhere in the dying seconds of the session and the first man to displace Vinales was none other than French rookie Fabio Quartararo, a 1m44.764s putting him top of the pops before he then ran off into the gravel trap.
Marc Marquez had to settle for third quickest ahead of Andrea Dovizioso.
Jack Miller went down as the chequered flag came out but had earlier registered a 1m45.577s which looked safe enough to see him through to Q2 if it rains tomorrow morning.
Rossi dropped in a last gasp 1m45.466s when it counted to take him from zero to almost hero which shuffled Miller down to seventh but the Australian remained in front of Danilo Petrucci.
Miguel Oliveira had gone down pretty hard with 25-minutes remaining in the 45-minute sessions. It was an ugly tumble for the 24-year-old through the kitty litter who was already coming into this weekend still carrying prior injuries.
| Pos | Rider | Bike | Nation | Points |
| 1 | Marc MARQUEZ | Honda | SPA | 325 |
| 2 | Andrea DOVIZIOSO | Ducati | ITA | 215 |
| 3 | Alex RINS | Suzuki | SPA | 167 |
| 4 | Maverick VIÑALES | Yamaha | SPA | 163 |
| 5 | Danilo PETRUCCI | Ducati | ITA | 162 |
| 6 | Valentino ROSSI | Yamaha | ITA | 145 |
| 7 | Fabio QUARTARARO | Yamaha | FRA | 143 |
| 8 | Jack MILLER | Ducati | AUS | 119 |
| 9 | Cal CRUTCHLOW | Honda | GBR | 102 |
| 10 | Franco MORBIDELLI | Yamaha | ITA | 90 |
| 11 | Pol ESPARGARO | KTM | SPA | 80 |
| 12 | Takaaki NAKAGAMI | Honda | JPN | 74 |
| 13 | Joan MIR | Suzuki | SPA | 58 |
| 14 | Aleix ESPARGARO | Aprilia | SPA | 46 |
| 15 | Francesco BAGNAIA | Ducati | ITA | 34 |
| 16 | Andrea IANNONE | Aprilia | ITA | 33 |
| 17 | Miguel OLIVEIRA | KTM | POR | 29 |
| 18 | Johann ZARCO | KTM | FRA | 27 |
| 19 | Jorge LORENZO | Honda | SPA | 23 |
| 20 | Tito RABAT | Ducati | SPA | 18 |
| 21 | Stefan BRADL | Honda | GER | 16 |
| 22 | Michele PIRRO | Ducati | ITA | 9 |
| 23 | Sylvain GUINTOLI | Suzuki | FRA | 7 |
| 24 | Hafizh SYAHRIN | KTM | MAL | 7 |
| 25 | Karel ABRAHAM | Ducati | CZE | 5 |
Source: MCNews.com.au