Reigning MotoGP World Champion Marc Marquez drew first blood in the opening free practice session at the Sachsenring this morning, leading Valentino Rossi by 0.336s while Britain’s Scott Redding put in a stormer to nab third place with his last lap.

Marquez was already sitting on top of the pile with a 1’21.838 but then opted to switch from the soft front tyre to the asymmetric front and managed to up his pace to a 1’21.766 compared to Rossi’s 1’22.102.

Redding got tucked in behind The Doctor on his final circuit and pulled himself along to a 1’22.167 to edge out Dani Pedrosa on the second full works Honda. The Spaniard had quietly gone about his business to sit in third place on a 1’22.243 before he was demoted by the Estrella Galicia man.

Yonny Hernandez ended as top Ducati on the Pramac satellite bike and was consistently in the top five, finishing in fifth with a 1’22.396 while a last lap by Andrea Dovizoso on the works GP15 saw him jump from outside the top ten into sixth place, one ahead of Jorge Lorenzo.

Aleix Espargaro ended in eighth place, just ahead of Cal Crutchlow whole Andrea Iannone rounded out the top ten with Maverick Vinales next along.

Pol Espargaro was the first victim of the notorious turn 11, the front of his Monster Yamaha giving up with 20 minutes of the session left to run but he got back out on his second bike to finish in 12th place.

Bradley Smith, on the second satelliite M1, started brightly with a couple of forays in the top five but slipped back to 13th but less than a second off the pace. Nicky Hayden grabbed Open class top spot in 15th, one behind Danilo Petrucci.

Eugene Laverty was 19th with brother Michael, who is replacing Marco Melandri for this round, ended in 23rd but only 2.6s off the pace.

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