Jorge Lorenzo said an insurance lap against the rain helped him finish second fastest on day one of MotoGP free practice at the Red Bull Ring.

The Spaniard ended a quarter of a second behind his team-mate Andrea Dovizioso, but said that his lap on the new tyre was an insurance lap in case of rain in FP3 to avoid Q1.

“We’re happy. We’re one of the top three guys in terms of speed and pace. But I believe we have some margin of improvement on the bike for tomorrow,” said Lorenzo.

“We decided to put a new tyre at the end in case tomorrow morning there are wet patches or rain. It was important that we go directly to the Q1 because if you don’t put a new tyre you can be eight tenths slower. If the rest put a new tyre you can be twelfth.

“It was more a safety reason than to demonstrate that we are fast. Just for the rain. If there was not a forecast of rain we would probably have kept the same tyre until the end.”

Ducati introduced a new fairing in Brno for the factory bikes and the Spaniard said that he would continue to use it this weekend.

“Well we used the same fairing as Brno,” he said. “It was new in Brno and we tried it. It has a similar feeling than the previous one, probably in the middle of the corner the bike is a little bit more feel, but it’s a very small difference. It’s similar.”