Vinales leads factory Yamaha 1-2 in MotoGP warm-up

Maverick Vinales was fastest in a MotoGP session for the fifth time this weekend as he led a factory Yamaha 1-2 in warm-up.

Rumours fled the MotoGP paddock on Saturday evening as Vinales was and is being heavily linked to a switch with Aprilia for 2022 - which would therefore terminate his current Yamaha deal - supposed to last until 2023, however, on track the Spaniard continued his impressive form at the Dutch TT. 

A lap time of 1:32.569s was over three tenths clear of team-mate Fabio Quartararo.  

Both factory Yamaha riders went out with a medium front tyre and hard rear, although Vinales’ hard tyre was showing as ‘new’ opposed to Quartararo’s used one.

In third was Alex Rins as he followed Vinales for much of the session. Rins arguably has the best race pace after the two Monster Energy Yamaha riders. An eighth place start means it will be crucial for Rins to make up places early if he is to claim a podium or even compete with Vinales and Quartararo. 

As was the case in qualifying, Takaaki Nakagami kept his position as the top Honda during warm-up - which has been the case for the last four weekends in this particular session. 

One place back was Marc Marquez who suffered his worst ever MotoGP qualifying yesterday of 20th. 

Johann Zarco was the fastest Ducati in sixth position. Pol Espargaro made it three Hondas inside the top ten with seventh. 

Rounding out the top ten was Iker Lecuona in eighth who has enjoyed his strongest weekend of the 2021 season to date in Assen, Francesco Bagnaia in ninth and tenth was Valentino Rossi.