Britain’s Bradley Smith upped his pace considerably in the second Sachsenring MotoGP free practice to take second place on the timeheets behind Marc Marquez while series leader Valentino Rossi dropped to seventh.
Marquez was on serious pace with eight laps in the 1’21s bracket and a further seven in the 1’22s. By comparison, Jorge Lorenzo and Smith only managed two in the 1’21s, Iannone just one, Dani Pedrosa two and Rossi none.
Smith and works Ducati man Andrea Iannone were lapping together at the end of the session and set a series of quick times which resulted in Smith finishing on a 1’21.740 - 0.119s behind Marquez - while Iannone was just 0.084s further back and easily the quickest of the Bologna bikes.
Yamaha’s Lorenzo ended his day as second fastest Yamaha in fourth place on a 1’21.886, edging Pedrosa’s Repsol Honda by 0.003s while Aleix Espargaro took the Ecstar Suzuki to sixth place in front of Rossi.
The Doctor is only half a second off the pace with a 1’22.159 and fought off a challenge by Britain’s Scott Redding who was just 0.011s behind the factory Yamaha man who has not been off the podium all season.
Yonny Hernandez kept up his pace from the first session and was the second Ducati home in ninth place, one ahead of Andrea Dovizioso who appears to be struggling at the German circuit this weekend. He crept into the top ten and will go through to qualifying two by right should it rain in the morning.
Hector Barbera finished at top Open class rider in 11th place with Cal Crtuchlow right behind him. The CWM LCR Honda man improved his time by a tenth this afternoon but could only finish in 12th place.
Pol Espargaro, who walked away from a big crash at turn 11 this morning, ended in 13th place and will be unhappy as his team-mate is in second place while Maverick Vinales ended in 14th place.
Nicky Hayden was top Open Honda in 16th place with a 1.3s gap to Marquez while Eugene Laverty ended in 23rd. Michael Laverty had to jump on to his second bike after he ran into the gravel trap with 20 minutes left and stalled. He finished the session in 24th.
