The choices made in the ten minutes available for the Warm-Up left little doubt as to which tire will be used in this afternoon's Portuguese Grand Prix, given that all 22 MotoGP riders opted for the medium rear.
The fastest in the end was Jorge Martin, who seemed much more stable on his Prima Pramac Racing Ducati. The Madrilenian was confident that the change of compound would eliminate or at least reduce the vibrations of the rear of the GP24 and indeed it seems to have been so, because he put everyone in line with his 1'39 “093.
Behind him, but a good 349 thousandths behind him, is poleman Enea Bastianini, who therefore went on to score a nice Ducati one-two. In the first five positions, however, we find four different brands, because next are the KTM of a Jack Miller who is particularly at ease here in Portimao, the Aprilia of the winner of the Sprint Mavirick Vinales, who will therefore be among the special observers today too, and the Honda of a surprising Takaaki Nakagami, who however used a soft on the front unlike all those before him who had a medium.
It's curious what happens behind the Japanese, because the two KTMs of rookie Pedro Acosta and Brad Binder set the same time to the thousandth of a second, separated by 457 thousandths. Then there is the other Aprilia of Raul Fernandez, which precedes a poker of Ducatis, led by the GP23s of Alex Marquez and Fabio Di Giannantonio, who therefore complete the top 10.
The world leader Pecco Bagnaia was left out, 11th at 551 thousandths, who this morning tried a modification aimed at trying to keep the rear of his GP24 more sewn to the ground, given that yesterday it was precisely the instability of this that led to to the mistake that cost him the victory in the Sprint. The Red poker is then completed with Franco Morbidelli, followed by Aleix Espargaro's Aprilia.
You have to go down to 15th place to find the Yamaha of Fabio Quartararo, who yesterday had already been the only one to run with the average also in the Sprint, but this morning he finds himself at almost seven tenths, with Alex Rins' twin M1 in the wake . Further back are Marco Bezzecchi and Luca Marini, who occupy 17th and 21st position respectively.
Behind the newcomer in Honda HRC there is only Marc Marquez, who suffered the third crash of his Portuguese weekend, thus completing just three laps and with a very high time. The eight-time world champion suffered a trivial crash at turn 3, which however prevented him from taking advantage of this last turn before this afternoon's race.
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