Indonesian MotoGP, Mandalika - Friday Practice Results

*Rookie.

Official Mandalika MotoGP records
Best lap: Fabio Quartararo 1m 31.067s (2022)
Fastest race lap: Jack Miller 1m 45.198s (2022)

Factory Aprilia duo Aleix Espargaro and Maverick Vinales dominate Friday practice for the 2023 Indonesian MotoGP, setting new Mandalika lap records.

But title leader Francesco Bagnaia missed out on the top ten, sending him into Saturday's Qualifying 1.

Bagnaia looked agitated on several occasions, including holding his arms wide open as he walked into the factory Ducati garage early on, and missed out on his final chance of a direct Qualifying 2 place when the rear of his Desmosedici stepped out.

By contrast, there was a round of applause for VR46 Ducati's Marco Bezzecchi, who was third fastest despite undergoing collarbone surgery just five days ago.

Bagnaia's closest title rival Jorge Martin was a safe fifth for Pramac Ducati.

Vinales and team-mate Espargaro exchanged places at the top of the timesheets for much of the hour as the RS-GP's low grip prowess - highlighted last month in Catalunya - continued.

The Aprilias were then among the first to fit new soft rubber for time attacks, extending their advantage even further, until Espargaro fell at Turn 10 while on course to set a new lap record.

Vinales duly beat the 2022 record shortly after. However it was to be a brief reign with the injured Bezzecchi, who only arrived at the track this morning, rocketing from 11th to 1st!

But Espargaro wasn't done, dusting himself off to set a 1m 30.474s, 0.170s under Bezzecchi's best, with Vinales then getting within 0.154s of his team-mate.

The final minutes had seen the likes of Marc Marquez and Brad Binder outside the top ten. Binder soon removed the pressure with what became fourth place, while team-mate Jack Miller fell for a second time in the hour but held onto the top ten.

The yellow flags for Miller piled pressure on Bagnaia, who had just one more chance to avoid Qualifying 1. But that lap ended with the off-throttle slide, leaving Bagnaia in just 16th place.

It was an eventful opening 15 minutes for KTM/GASGAS with Binder and Augusto Fernandez suffering synchronised falls at Turn 11. Binder's bike took down Fernandez who had run wide just ahead of him. Miller was then sent sliding off at high speed after catching a slow-moving Enea Bastianini (with his hand in the air) on the racing line.

Bastianini later crashed out on his own, leaving him at the tail end of the timesheets, ahead of only Alex Rins.

Bezzecchi had been passed fit to ride for the remainder of the weekend despite a fast fall at the end of FP1.

However, Alex Marquez abandoned his return from rib injuries after FP1, due to the pain.