Leopard’s Dennis Foggia maintained his command on the Moto3 times after FP3 at Le Mans on Saturday morning.
The Italian’s Friday time was unchallenged, even by himself as he topped the final free practice with a 1’41.710, Gaviota GasGas Aspar’s Izan Guevara coming within 0.066s of the session best and 0.09s of the outright pace. Tatsuki Suzuki completing the successful showing fro the Leopard outfit in third.
Final practice welcomed a cool Bugatti track as the lightweight class fired up on Saturday morning. Suzuki led the early times with Guevara and Mario Aji for company as the Leopard rider circulated two seconds adrift of his teammate’s target time.
John McPhee was running top four after the opening ten minutes, just 0.08s behind KTM’s Jaume Masia. The Scot’s Sterilgarda Husqvarna teammate four places back as the times continued to refine towards Friday’s best with VisionTrack’s Scott Ogden rounding to the top ten - eight-tenths off the session’s pace.
Friday hero Dennis Foggia began day two from fifth, trailed by Carlos Tatay, Deniz Öncü, Ayumu Sasaki and Andrea Migno with Ogden the only rider so far to have improved on their individual pace overnight. The halfway stage found the Italian up to third but still one second off his leading pace with Migno and the CF Moto pairing of Tatay and Artigas joining the front running pack as the second half played out. The latter securing his initial place in Q2 contention, from tenth, with his 1’42.668 lap.
The impressive stand-in ride from Jose Rueda continued on the Rivacold Snipers as the Spaniard claimed seventh in the session, narrowly adrift of the promotion zone overall. Öncü suffering the first highside of the morning with the Turk crawling away from his stricken Tech3 machine after a violent flick at turn 14.
The closing stages saw the pace begin to ignite, Stefano Nepa the first to strike as he claimed 14th, demoting the fallen Öncü out of Q2. Foggia took charge of the session on his 13th lap before Masia returned the strike and Joel Kelso swept up to third on the CIP Green Power KTM. The Leopard returning to dominance, albeit still half a second adrift of his Friday benchmark with the pack shuffling behind him.
Improvements saw Guevara set the first 1’41 of the day, on his way to second overall, McPhee dumped out of the promotion zone in the fin al action, running 20th and behind Ogden with two minutes left on the clock.
Ivan Ortola suffered his second crash of the session, at turn 13 as the penultimate minute counted down, as McPhee advanced to 12th overall. Sasaki doing likewise two places higher with Diogo Moreira now precarious in 14th.
The chequered flag found Foggia’s Friday time unchallenged - the Italian setting the fastest of the morning thanks to a late 1’41.710 - with Guevara and Suzuki the closest rivals overall. Tatay topped Masia, Artigas, Migno and Daniel Holgado as the fastest eight riders with Ryusei Yamanaka and Sergio Garcia leading the Husqvarna duo in the final standings. Kelso and Moreira completed the promotion zone after the 40-minute session with Ogden and teammate Josh Whatley sitting 21st and 30th as practice concluded.
