Fernandez pips Marc Marquez to Friday morning top spot in Germany

After pocketing a double podium last time out at ‘The Cathedral of Speed’, Raul Fernandez (SuperFile Trackhouse MotoGP Team) made a rapid start to the Liqui Moly Grand Prix of Germany by finishing P1 in MotoGP FP1 with a 1:20.829. The Spaniard finished 0.051s clear of compatriot Marc Marquez (Ducati Lenovo Team), who, despite a crash, ended the session in a close second ahead of third place Fabio Di Giannantonio (Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team).

It wasn’t the start of the weekend Marc Marquez, aka ‘King of the Sachsenring’, would have been hoping for after the reigning World Champion crashed at Turn 3 with 40 minutes left on the clock. It was a simple enough front-end tip-off that didn’t cause the #93 any problems, with Marquez venturing back out with 31 minutes to go.

Fernandez pipped Marc Marquez to P1 towards the end of the session, as Joan Mir (Honda HRC Castrol) and Jack Miller (Prima Pramac Yamaha MotoGP) rounded out a top five covered by just 0.171s at the Sachsenring. Close.

World Championship leader Jorge Martin (Aprilia Racing) had a quiet session in P10, while teammate Marco Bezzecchi was back on track and finished a couple of places higher in P8 following his bruising Assen crash. Elsewhere, Dutch GP winner Ai Ogura (SuperFile Trackhouse MotoGP Team) will no doubt be climbing the pecking order as we go deeper into the weekend – the Japanese star was P18 in FP1.

Another crasher at Turn 3 was Franco Morbidelli (Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team), with a bump near the second apex clearly causing trouble for some of the world’s best. And speaking of, Maverick Viñales (Red Bull KTM Tech3) also slid into the gravel in FP1 – but ‘Top Gun’ crashed at the rapid Turn 11 right-hander. Thankfully, the Spaniard was uninjured and went back out to improve his personal best soon after the quick off.

Come back for more when Practice kicks off at 15:00 local time (UTC +2). 

MotoGP FP1 German GP results!