Jorge Martin ended Day One at the Malaysian Grand Prix in second after a late crash in the afternoon Practice session.

Jorge Martin enters the penultimate round of the 2024 MotoGP season with a 17-point lead. The Spaniard needs to stay within reach of his rival Francesco Bagnaia this weekend to keep control of the Championship lead.

In both Friday Practice sessions in Malaysia Bagnaia took the top spot. Whereas Martin was in sixth and second across the two sessions. Martin's Friday afternoon ended with a crash, but he still finished in second place.

"For sure not ideal with the crash," Martin said after the Friday Practice session. "But I think it was good to crash because it is always interesting to understand why and to find the limit is always good. I feel confident, I feel we are doing a good job and I want to feel confident with our work. I saw that Pecco is strong, but so are we, so it is not a reason to be nervous or anything like that. Let's see tomorrow if we can do a great Qualifying and Sprint."

'I am focused on myself because he is not riding too much.'

Throughout the day Martin did a lot of work on used tyres and was working on his race pace. The #89 is happy with where he is at in terms of pace but is still lacking front feeling heading into Saturday.

"I think in terms of pace at the moment we are quite good," Martin told MotoGP.com. "I still miss a bit in understanding the front tyre, it seems with the medium tyre it is not bad. Normally with the medium we struggle but here with the temperatures it is not bad. Overall, a good day, we need to keep working this way and everything will go well."

In the morning Free Practice One session there were some mind games at play between Martin and Bagnaia. The Prima Pramac Racing rider tried to follow his title rival, but Bagnaia slowed his pace to prevent Martin from learning anything from him.

"For me, I went for a normal run and I saw that Pecco was stopped," Martin explained. "I followed him a bit to try and learn something but not this time so I continued my run. I am focused on myself because he is not riding too much, he is not doing too many laps. So, it is difficult to tell where he is at in terms of pace, I will check the time attack to try and be closer. But it is difficult to analyse."