MotoGP Europe: Mir leads the way after first dry session in warm-up

Joan Mir left it to the final seconds of the warm-up session to head into the race with the best time of the weekend as the class enjoyed their first taste of dry track time ahead of the European MotoGP at Valencia.

The championship leader looked unpressured and confident, his ambition to find out what he could do was undented by a small incident with Alex Marquez, where unhappy with his lap he sat up and left his compatriot to wobble with nowhere to go.

He posted the best lap of the weekend, a 1m 32.251s, right at the close of the session aboard the Suzuki. Mir starts the race from fifth on the grid.

The session was peppered with bike changes as the riders tried out several tyre settings, effectively trying to fit their usual practice times worth of dry running into a twenty minute warm-up.

Aleix Espargaro got his Aprilia in good order. Leading the way in the closes stages before Mir snatched up the top slot, his lap was still good enough for second and just 0.041s slower in a tight session.

Jack Miller proved he as proficient in the dry as he is in the wet, climbing to third late on for Pramac Ducati.

Teruel’s polesitter Takaaki Nakagami lead the standings briefly on his way to fourth for LCR Honda just ahead of his front row start.

This weekend’s pole man Pol Espargaro looked race ready in fifth as he worked with his brother on track to find the best settings and time possible on his Red Bull KTM.

Alex Marquez was always able to come back and improve over the session, a string of personal best laps leaving the Repsol Honda rider sixth at the end of the run out.

Franco Morbidelli was the only rider to experiment with a hard rear tyre, he was seventh for Petronas and the best of the Yamahas.

Alex Rins was eighth fastest on the second Suzuki, with the injured Cal Crutchlow battling to ninth on the other LCR Honda entry.

Maverick Vinales didn’t display the pace he’ll need to make anything of his pit lane start in tenth quickest on the factory Yamaha, as the Spaniard continues to endure a particularly tough weekend.

Mir’s closest title rival Fabio Quartararo was also as off the pace in the dry as he had been in the wet. The Petronas Yamaha SRT rider was thirteenth in the session and will line up eleventh on the grid.

Valentino Rossi missed the first day of action waiting for a negative Covid-19 test and has been playing catch-up all weekend. His extensive track knowledge will help come the race but the Monster Energy Yamaha rider could only manage a best of 19th in warm-up.