Somkiat Chantra achieved a perfect day on the first day of the Japanese Moto2 Grand Prix. The rider was once again the fastest in the second practice session, which he led for most of the time.
At the end of the first flying laps, Pedro Acosta (Red Bull KTM Ajo/Kalex) was leading ahead of Chantra (Idemitsu Honda Team Asia/Kalex) – who continued to show his speed after leading in P1. The Thai rider took the command 31 minutes from the end, while his teammate Ai Ogura moved up to second.
For a long time, the changes in the timing sheet only occurred behind Chantra… until Sam Lowes (Elf Marc VDS/Kalex) dethroned him with seven minutes to go. This was an important phase of the session, as riders were looking to set fast times to secure direct qualification for Q2 in case of rain during the third practice session tomorrow.
After being beaten, Chantra didn’t give up and returned to the top of the timing sheet, passing Lowes. Acosta improved but not enough to pass the two riders ahead of him. In the end, Chantra improved once again to set the fastest lap of the day (1m50.396s), finishing 0.037s ahead of Arón Canet (Pons Wegow Los40/Kalex), who beat Lowes.
Acosta and Ogura completed the top five. In the combined timesheet, Alonso López (Beta Tools SpeedUp/Boscoscuro) holds the last direct qualification spot for Q2 in 14th place with a 0.058s margin over his teammate Alonso López.
Timesheet: