Pedro Acosta Leads the Pack on the First Day of the Valência GP
Pedro Acosta was the rider to beat on the last Friday (14) of the MotoGP season. The Spanish rider recorded a time of 1min29s240 and ended the first day of the Valência GP in the lead by just 0s053, with Marco Bezzecchi in second and Franco Morbidelli in third.
Bezzecchi started strong and led for much of the first few minutes, but suffered a fall on turn 4 while following Acosta. Just before that, Ai Ogura had also fallen on turn 3, interrupting the rhythm of the session.
Meanwhile, Fabio Di Giannantonio and Morbidelli reached the top of the standings, until Acosta improved his time and set 1min29s790. On the next lap, in an impressive and consistent manner, he repeated exactly the same time.
Fabio Quartararo had problems with his bike on the main straight, already in the second half of the session. The failure seemed to end his work with his first bike for the day.
About 15 minutes from the end, Acosta increased his lead by recording 1min29s240 again, opening up more than half a second over his rivals. Jack Miller even rose to second, and Morbidelli reduced the difference, but was still far from the leader’s time.
In the final minutes of the session, Alex Márquez, Di Giannantonio, and Quartararo himself improved and pushed Morbidelli back. Bezzecchi then closed in, finishing just 0s053 behind Acosta after his best lap.
Miller returned to the top-3, and the final stretch shuffled the group even more. Ogura went from 15th to 3rd, while Francesco Bagnaia continued to struggle to enter the top 10 and ultimately missed out on direct classification for Q2.
At the end of the day, the top-10 consisted of Acosta in first, followed by Bezzecchi, Morbidelli, Alex Márquez, Ogura, Miller, Di Giannantonio, Fermín Aldeguer, Joan Mir, and Quartararo. Moreover, only 0s5 separated the leader from the 14th-placed rider.
