Diogo Moreira surprises in first free practice at Motegi, Guevara 7th

Brazilian Diogo Moreira (KTM) ‘charges’ the lead on the first day of practice at the Moto3 Japanese Grand Prix He won the Motegi ‘Twin Ring’ circuit on the last lap after beating Italy’s Dennis Foggia (Honda) and local idol Ayumu Sasaki (KTM).

world championship leader, Izan Guevara (GasGas) finished seventh.

After two years of not riding the Motegi ‘Twin Ring’ circuit, and just one practice session, the Moto3 riders are convinced that it could start raining on Japanese tracks at some point during the day. We jumped first on track and they did it in a hurry and quickly found a good classification. Or you thought Saturday’s second round free practice was already raining.

With these ‘wickerwork’, the session’s first leader was Jaume Macia (KTM), who set quick laps on the second and third laps.chased by local Ayumu Sasaki (Husqvarna) and Italian Dennis Foggia (Honda), while another local rider Tatsuki Suzuki (Honda) had problems going off the track and suffered his first accident of the day. I was about to get caught up in

Sasaki improved his partials lap after lap and by lap four he was already four thousandths of a second ahead of Macia, as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, Macia had the most consistent increase in pace, setting another personal best on lap five (1:58.069).to defend session leadership, was the first ‘victim’ of the Japanese trucks when Japan’s Taiyo Furusato (Honda) crashed at Turn 5, the entrance curve to the first tunnel of the ‘Twin Ring’ But the Spaniard saw the situation as it was, with the track limit being exceeded a few minutes later and the record being canceled.

With Masia in the lead and Sasaki behind, Turkey’s Deniz Onju (KTM) was third in discord., World Championship leader Izan Guevara (Gas Gas) was sixth, 0.7 seconds behind his compatriot, but his teammate and one of the main rivals in the race for the 2022 Moto3 title, Sergio. Garcia Dols was 10th. position.

It didn’t take long for Izan Guevara’s first time on the difficult track to turn around as he rolled in 1:57.664 on lap 9 and took the lead by nearly half a second. He was already ahead of fourth place against Italy’s Ricardo Rossi (Honda) and third-placed Japanese Ryusei Yamanaka (KTM), the latter two of whom were displaced by Itsuki Suzuki a little later. rice field.

A beautiful fight was established between Ayumu Sasaki and Izan Guevara in the final minutesa positive initial balance for the Japanese, lapped in 1:57.493, beating the Spaniard by 171 thousandths of a second, but the last lap of the session was once again decisive in the classification order.

In that final battle, Itsuki Suzuki, who was stationed after his compatriot, also interfered., only 117 thousandths of a second, but Britain’s John McPhee (Husqvarna) took the best split of any driver to demote him to 3rd. This allowed us to foresee eventual changes in the order of arrival.

And Brazilian Diogo Moreira (KTM), also new to the Japanese track, took the lead with a time of 1:57.252., 195000ths of a second followed by Dennis Foggia, Ayumu Sasaki for third, John McPhee passed by Spain’s David Muñoz (KTM), followed by Itsuki Suzuki and Izan Guevara, followed by Deniz Onju (KTM). 11th, Adrian Fernandez (KTM), 13th, Jaume Macia, Xavier Artigas (CFMoto), Daniel Holgado (KTM), Sergio Garcia Drus.

Ivan Ortolá KTM) finished 19th, Carlos Tatay (CFMoto) 23rd and Ana Carrasco (KTM) 29th.