Cluzel delights home French crowd in Moto2 Friday session

Jules Cluzel started the Monster Energy Grand Prix de France weekend exactly as he would have planned to on Friday afternoon, by setting the fastest lap of the first Moto2 practice session at Le Mans as he eyes up the first GP win of his career on the familiar territory of home soil.

The Forward Racing rider’s lap of 1’39.827 placed him at the top of the timesheet on board his Suter chassis, just under a tenth of a second ahead of Alex de Angelis (RSM Team Scot). The San Marinese rider was impressively quick as he made his track return after missing the last race at Jerez, following a crash in warm-up at the previous round.

Completing the top three was Toni Elías, as the Spaniard of the Gresini Racing Moto2 team aims to follow up his victory last time out with another strong result. Elías was 0.278s off the pace of Cluzel, with Sergio Gadea (Tenerife 40 Pons) and Fonsi Nieto (G22 Holiday Gym) fourth and fifth fastest respectively and separated by a margin of just 0.029s.

Making it five different chassis inside the top six times was Tech3 Moto2 rider Yuki Takahashi, whilst Julián Simón adapted to his new Suter in super quick time having only tested the Swiss-made frame for the first time last week after the Mapfre Aspar team made the decision to change chassis suppliers. The Spanish rider was seventh quickest, with Ratthapark Wilairot (Thai Honda PTT Singha-SAG) adding the Bimota name to the top ten as he became the final rider to get within a second of Cluzel.

Thomas Lüthi (Interwetten Moriwaki Racing) and Andrea Iannone (Fimmco Speed Up) completed the top ten, and Moto2 FP2 commences at 11.10am local time on Saturday morning.