Pol Espargaro concludes final day of Moto2 with record breaking lap

 with TWOWHEELSBLOG

Pol Espargaro is already in championship form and so his Kalex machine, and finishing six out of eight sessions at Valencia on the top of the charts, sending out a clear shot to his rivals.

The Pons rider posted a stunning lap early this afternoon in 1’34″577, which was almost a second faster than his best time yesterday and six tenths of second faster than his pole position record during last season’s Valencia GP weekend.

Espargaro wasn’t the only rider to go below the 1.35 threshold, Nico Terol was second and just two tenths of second behind him, while Julian Simon on his Kalex finished third and four tenths adrift and Jordi Torres took fourth on the second Aspar-Suter bike and making it four Spanish riders in the top four.

Thomas Luthi posted his fastest lap in the morning to take fifth, but he clashed with Ratthapark Wilairot and both riders crashed. The Interwetten rider was shipped off to the hospital where he was treated for a suspected fractured right arm and collarbone, while the Gresini rider was treated at the circuit for a head injury.

Takaaki Nakagami was sixth and the fastest rider in the final session while Scott Redding and Tito Rabat were seventh and eighth respectively and separted by just 0.034s. Simone Corsi continues to be the fastest Speed Up rider in 9th, while Ioda’s Johann Zarco was tenth and he was one of the several riders who crashed.

Other crashers included Alex de Angelis who finished the day in 21st and just 0.002s faster than Moto2 rookie and reigning Moto3 champion Sandro Cortese. Louis Rossi also suffered a tumble with his Tech3 Mistral 610.

The next official Moto2/Moto3 test will be at Jerez from February 19 to the 21.

Moto3 Valencia combined test results:

01- Pol Espargaro 1’34.577
02- Nico Terol + 0.200
03- Julian Simon + 0.404
04- Jordi Torres + 0.507
05- Thomas Luthi + 0.516
06- Takaaki Nakagami + 0.545
07- Scott Redding + 0.716
08- Tito Rabat + 0.740
09- Simone Corsi + 0.788
10- Johann Zarco + 0.822