Australia’s former world champion Casey Stoner laid down a marker for the French Grand Prix on Friday with the Honda rider setting the fastest time in practice.
Stoner, who won the season opener in Qatar, led a Honda one-two-three in the two sessions with Marco Simoncelli and Dani Pedrosa tucked in behind.
The Australian set the fastest lap of 1min 33.782sec in the afternoon session which was 0.404sec faster than Simoncelli.
“The track has quite good grip and we have a better feeling than in the past few years in this track and we are very happy,” said Stoner.
“Every session we do we’re trying to modify something to improve the bike, I don’t know if this is good enough to get pole at the moment as people are able to pull out a very good lap on the soft tyre. Today we are fast but I’m sure tomorrow the others will also be quick.”
Pedrosa, the winner in Estoril last time out, was the only rider unable to improve on his time set in the morning practice, in a session which was much hotter than the conditions in the morning.
The Spaniard’s time was 1min 34.431sec, compared to 1min 34.478sec in the afternoon.
Nicky Hayden, on a Ducati, claimed the fourth fastest time with Yamaha’s reigning world champion Jorge Lorenzo, the winner here in 2009 and 2010, was fifth.
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