Smith rises to the top in Catalunya heat

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Bradley Smith rose to the top of the MotoGP practice timesheets during scorching conditions at the Catalunya MotoGP on Friday afternoon.

Just 13th this morning, Smith shot from twelfth to first in the closing minutes of FP2 while running the medium rear tyre (the softer of his choices), with which he spent much of the session.

The Englishman lapped 1.6s faster than in FP1, but the soft-tyre morning best of Open class star Aleix Espargaro remained the quickest of the day by 0.451s over Smith.

LCR Honda's Stefan Bradl was just 0.007s slower than Smith's Monster Yamaha Tech 3 for second in the afternoon, with home star and world champion Marc Marquez pushed down to third (0.151s) for Repsol Honda after leading much of FP2.

The usual flood of Friday afternoon improvements were tempered by the 34 degree heat (55-degrees on the track), prompting widespread trials of the hardest tyre options in a session held at the same time as Sunday's race.

All riders have the same soft, medium or hard front tyres available, but there is a difference in the rear allocation: The Factory class Honda and Yamaha riders can use the medium or hard compounds, while the Open class and Ducati riders have the soft and medium available.

Marquez, seeking a perfect seventh win of the year on Sunday, had been seventh and one-second behind Espargaro in FP1.

But the Repsol Honda Marquez defied the baking heat to lead for large parts of the 45-minutes, beating his FP1 best by half a second on a day that saw four of the combined top ten fail to improve.

Defending Catalunya winner Jorge Lorenzo dropped from second to fifth, but at least found a further 0.2s. Movistar Yamaha team-mate Valentino Rossi was unable to improve and slipped from fourth to seventh overall.

Marquez's team-mate Dani Pedrosa was another high profile rider not to lap quicker than in the morning, finishing FP2 in tenth place, 0.955s behind Smith.

With Pramac's Andrea Iannone also not improving, factory rider Andrea Dovizioso was the top Desmosedici with seventh in FP2.

It was a mixed afternoon for the Espargaro brothers, who grew up just a few kilometers from the circuit. Pol moved up to fifth (+0.485s behind team-mate Smith) but Aleix was only twelfth (+1.075s) on the medium compound rear.

At present, the top ten riders on combined practice times - allowing them to go directly into Qualifying 2 - are: A. Espargaro, Smith, Bradl, Marquez, Lorenzo, Iannone, Rossi, P. Espargaro, Pedrosa and Dovizioso respectively.

Thunderstorms remain a threat.

Free Practice 2:
1. Bradley Smith
2. Stefan Bradl
3. Marc Marquez
4. Jorge Lorenzo
5. Pol Espargaro
6. Valentino Rossi
7. Andrea Dovizioso
8. Yonny Hernandez
9. Andrea Iannone
10. Dani Pedrosa
11. Alvaro Bautista
12. Aleix Espargaro
13. Scott Redding
14. Cal Crutchlow
15. Colin Edwards
16. Michele Pirro
17. Hector Barbera
18. Nicky Hayden
19. Hiroshi Aoyama
20. Karel Abraham
21. Michael Laverty
22. Broc Parkes
23. Mike Di Meglio
24. Michel Fabrizio