Monster Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales topped the final day of MotoGP testing with a stunning fastest lap to take him seven-tenths under the lap record and two tenths clear of an unfamiliar challenger.

Vinales put in a 1’54.208 on his 25th lap of 50 to top the day but it was the Petronas Yamaha of Fabio Quartararo - who has got over his braking problems - who took runner-up spot with a 1’54.441 to edge out reigning champion Marc Marquez.

The Repsol Honda man crashed unhurt in the final hour and was followed into the gravel by team-mate Jorge Lorenzo, who also walked away.

So it’s Yamaha who leave Qatar on top despite a windier day three, with Viñales putting in 50 laps on Monday and Rossi 38. The Italian was pretty positive and said it came from putting “everything together”, but the Spaniard did still insist they need to improve and one of the big things he pointed out was edge grip, where he said the Yamaha is lacking a little compared to other manufacturers.

Quartararo, meanwhile, did 48 laps and his day two showing was far from a fluke, with team-mate Franco Morbidelli shooting up the timesheets to sixth on Monday too. That makes good reading for both the Iwata marque and the new Petronas Yamaha team, with all Yamahas in the top six.

Repsol Honda were the only other team and manufacturer to mix it with them on Monday, although both machines took tumbles – riders OK.  Marquez was third with a 1:54.613 and did 53 laps, again showing the capacity to put more mileage on his shoulder, and Lorenzo took fifth just 0.040 off Marquez and 0.002 from Rossi. After two much tougher days on the timesheets hovering outside the top 15 as he both changes bike and comes back from a scaphoid broken only a month ago, the five-time World Champion catapulted himself up to a 1'54.653 on Day 3.

Takaaki Nakagami (LCR Honda Idemitsu), meanwhile, also had a solid final day as he finished in eighth despite a crash, and the Japanese rider concludes testing with a sheet of consistent top tens. He did 50 laps with a best of 1'54.789,. Britain's Cal Crutchlow (LCR Honda Castrol) was down in 17th after 39 laps.

Another big headline on the last day of preseason came from the consistently impressive Pol Espargaro (Red Bull KTM), who was a stunning seventh on a best effort of 1'54.770. The Spaniard put in 37 laps as the Austrian factory continue working on the details, and the second quickest KTM was actually Miguel Oliveira (Red Bull KTM Tech3) on Monday as the Portuguese rookie was within around a second of Espargaro. Johann Zarco (Red Bull KTM Factory Racing) was a little further down the timesheets on Monday in P22.

Danilo Petrucci (Mission Winnow Ducati), meanwhile, retained his stronghold on the timesheets amongst the Borgo Panigale machines. The Italian was ninth on day three after another 43 laps, with teammate Andrea Dovizioso down in P15 after 50 but they focused on long runs and race setup. The engine and fairing and bigger decisions were already made before the end of action. Jack Miller (Alma Pramac Ducati) improved to tenth on his final of 57 laps, and his team-mate, rookie Francesco Bagnaia, wasn’t far off in 13th – just two tenths off. He was closely followed by Reale Avintia’s Tito Rabat.

Between that Ducati invasion were nestled both of the Team Suzuki Ecstar machines. Although third overall from his Day 2 laptime, Alex Rins ended Monday in P11 on a 1'54.852 after 41 laps and rookie teammate Joan Mir was the second quickest rookie in 12th. The gap between the two Hamamatsu factory machines was only a tenth and a half…

Aprilia, meanwhile, were happy with their improvements and although Andrea Iannone was P16 and Aleix Espargaro P19, they were focusing more on longer runs, for Espargaro especially – and overall across the test Espargaro was P14. The Noale factory were also happy with the adaptation shown by Iannone after the Italian had to sit out much of Sepang with illness, which is a big positive after a difficult recent run.

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Combined three-day times