Alex Rins continued his devastating form of FP1 by posting the quickest time of the day in Austin. His FP2 time of 2:09.564 is just three tenths off of Xavier Simeon’s outright best lap of the Circuit of the Americas set in qualifying last year.
Simone Corsi made a late charge to challenge the Spaniard, setting provisionally the fastest lap with six minutes of the session remaining. It was short lived and Rins snatched it back moments later, beating the Italian into second overall by 0.180.
Argentina race winner Johan Zarco was pushing his limits to end the day in third, just 0.016 behind Corsi. Takaaki Nakagami continues his form in fourth place, with Marcel Schrotter in fifth.
Britain’s Sam Lowes suffered a couple of day one crashes before ending the day sixth quickest. He slid out at turn 18 in FP1, but returned to the pits uninjured. However in FP2 he suffered a second crash, this time collecting Ratthapark Wilairot. Lowes was able to return to the track without much damage. However, the Thai rider seemed to be in some discomfort and had to sit out most of the remainder of the session waiting for his bike to be returned.
Sandro Cortese ended the day in seventh, with Thomas Luthi in eighth and Dominique Aegerter in ninth. Luis Salom found some long-awaited form in 10th, a massive improvement on his 22nd place in FP1. Only two riders failed to improve on their FP1 time: Jonas Folger in 11th by fractions of a second, and the luckless Wilairot in 28th.
Although he was able to improve his FP1 time by around a second, reigning Moto3 champion Danny Kent ended the day in 24th position.
FP3 for the Moto2 riders is due to take place tomorrow at 1655 BST, followed by qualifying at 2105.
