Johann Zarco, LCR Honda, 2026 French MotoGP
© Gold and Goose

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MotoGP France LIVE: Friday practice at Le Mans

Live text coverage of Friday practice at the 2026 MotoGP French Grand Prix

KEY MOMENTS

Practice is at 2pm BST
Luca Marini tops FP1
Numerous teams have upgrades
Jonas Folger standing in for Maverick Vinales

The fifth round of the 2026 MotoGP season takes place at the French Grand Prix and the iconic Le Mans Bugatti circuit.

Famous for its 24-hour endurance race, Le Mans welcomes back MotoGP to its Bugatti circuit, for an event that has seen record attendance in recent years.

Aprilia and Marco Bezzecchi come to the French Grand Prix leading the championship, after the Italian was second at the recent Spanish Grand Prix.

Bezzecchi has good memories from Le Mans, having won at the circuit in 2023 when he was with VR46 Ducati.

He leads the championship by 11 points from team-mate Jorge Martin, who is also a previous winner at Le Mans.

Ducati will be hoping for bigger things in France, after winning the Spanish Grand Prix with Alex Marquez. A good test on the Monday at Jerez has the Italian marque confident of being more competitive.

Marc Marquez will hope that rings true, after a crash at the Spanish Grand Prix further complicated his championship defence.

French fans will have their eyes fixed on the skies again, in the hopes that rain could open the door for another victory for Johann Zarco, following his triumph last year.

Maverick Vinales remains out for Tech3's home race, with Jonas Folger making a surprise return to action in his place.

2026 French MotoGP: Friday schedule

FP1: 9:45am BST - 10:30am BST

Practice: 2pm BSt-3pm BST

Lewis Duncan

08 May 2026

09:45

Fabio di Giannantonio 2027 update

di Giannantonio: Factory MotoGP support essential for title chance

Fabio di Giannantonio, VR46 Ducati.
© Gold and Goose

09:40

Ahead of this weekend, Aprilia and Marco Bezzecchi lead the world championship after finishing second at Jerez.

Bezzecchi is a former winner at Le Mans, so he'll start favourite.

09:35

The Dunlop chicane is usually the most crashed-at corner of the entire calendar. It's already been catching riders out in the other sessions this morning.

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09:30

Pitlane opens in 15 minutes for FP1.

If this is your first MotoGP weekend, then here's how things work.

FP1 runs for 45 minutes and is a free practice session. The times in this session do not count towards any other part of the weekend.

Practice runs for an hour this afternoon, with the top 10 at the end of this session gaining direct entry to Q2 qualifying on Saturday. The rest will go through Q1, with the top two in that session moving to Q2.

09:26

Away from Le Mans, Liberty Media has set social media ablaze with comments that it is eyeing a potential MotoGP race in Miami.

What do you think?