In the cold first free practice session, things looked to be heading in the right direction, with both riders feeling competitive and satisfied with their bikes’ setup. As the temperature rose in the afternoon though, both Garrett Gerloff and Kohta Nozane were unable to extract the one-lap speed seen in the morning, whereas the long-run pace remained strong. The GRT Yamaha team remains confident, as the temperature is forecasted to be lower on Saturday.
In the morning’s FP1, Gerloff picked up where he had left off in the winter tests, and was immediately quick enough to clock in the third-fastest time, a 1’50.442. In the FP2, he struggled due to the lack of grip, but still managed to set a 1’51.238, good enough for 10th position. The 34 laps run throughout the day allowed the American and his crew to collect information and data that will be crucial for the choice of this weekend’s race setup.
Nozane, instead, focused on building over the experience made during the Aragón tests of the last months, in order to start getting closer to his teammate and the leaders. His Friday started well, with a 1’51.376 in FP1 giving him the 14th fastest time and which, more importantly, placed him a respectable 1.4 seconds behind Razgatlioglu’s chart-topping 1’49.952, closer than he managed to get to the leader throughout pre-season. In FP2, like most other riders, he did not manage to improve his lap time, and was 15th, a 1'52.238 being his fastest lap of the session. He completed 33 laps in total throughout the day.
For Friday’s combined times, click here.
