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The rain has been the main protagonist of Friday's free practice in Misano. The MotoGP riders have had to deal with the liquid element already in the last minutes of FP1, while in the second free practice the track was directly flooded from the beginning.
Johann Zarco has gone home with the best weather in the rain stopping the clock at 1: 42.097, but could not beat Maverick Viñales' dry time in the morning. The Aprilia driver ended the day being the fastest and another dip in FP3 would make him go straight into Q2.
Scare for Iker Lecuona, who has come flying out of his KTM
The wet free practice at Misano served to demonstrate once again how effective the Ducati is in the rain. Zarco was the fastest rider ahead of Pecco Bagnaia and Jack Miller. And it is that the ideal way to drive the Ducati works very well with such delicate track conditions.
The great scare of the day was given by Iker Lecuona, who has suffered a spectacular fall in which he has been thrown out of his KTM. Fortunately, the Valencian has withdrawn on his own foot, albeit limping, from the Misano circuit. Enea Bastianini has also been rubbed by Italian water.
Andrea Dovizioso has completed his return to MotoGP although not too brilliantly. In fact, in the morning, in dry conditions, he finished last, while in the rain of the afternoon session he was able to climb to 21st position. But he's still a long way from the head and will suffer with that 2019 Yamaha.
He has also debuted Franco Morbidelli, in his case in the official Yamaha team, with the 2021 motorcycle and in a worthy thirteenth position. Still limping from his knee, Morbidelli had a very dignified performance both in the dry and in the rain, and it seems that he will be able to give Yamaha the necessary boost to also fight for the team world championship.
Behind the Ducati has gotten the Suzuki of Joan Mir, which today had very good feelings both in the dry and in the wet, a circumstance that the champion has never been good at. We'll see if at Misano, where they had a great performance a year ago, Mir and Suzuki can fight for that first win of 2021.
With the fifth position he had to settle Marc Márquez, who has also had some sortie off the track in the rain. As always, the Honda leader was the bravest rider and in difficult conditions he already took to the track in the last minutes of morning practice.
By the way, that in Misano there is 24 motorcycles on the track due to the presence of Michele Pirro and Stefan Bradl as 'wild card'. The Ducati rider was placed in twelfth position, but the Honda test rider was only able to be third to last, ahead of Luca Marini and the Japanese Takaaki Nakagami.
The best KTM was that of Miguel Oliveira, sixth, and the best Aprilia that of Aleix Espargaró, eighth, since Maverick Viñales was cautious in the rain to finish seventeenth. Valentino Rossi starts sixteenth at home and with some exit from the track, while the world leader Fabio Quartararo, has been eighteenth.
