John McPhee’s first outing in front of the home crowds on the Sterilgarda Husqvarna Moto3 proved successful at Silverstone on Friday.

Fastest overall by the close of play thanks to a 2’10.939 - almost two and a half seconds faster than his morning effort - McPhee was the only lightweight rider under the 2’11 barrier.

The Scot held a near-half-second advantage over Aspar’s Izan Guevara after FP2, with the team hopeful the lap will grant him direct access into Q2 even without a final push on Saturday morning.

“It has been a really nice day here in Silverstone, in my own GP,” McPhee said after a perfect Friday. “I enjoyed the day a lot. The support from the home fans and the crowd always helps and so it is nice to finish day one with no problems.

“We have been able to do a lot of laps already in FP1 and in FP2 we were faster and managed to build up a small margin, so it is certainly a nice way to start the weekend.

“It was kind of steady away this morning in FP1,” he continued. “Saying that I went quickest up until eight minutes to go. Two times I’ve been at Silverstone and just, I guess been a bit excited and ended up having fairly big crashes in FP1 so steady away, ended up only four-tenths off, in P10, but knew there was more to come. Then to finish fastest overall and have a small gap there as well, I’m hoping that lap will be good enough to put us through to Q2.

“It is nice for me to be able to ride a little bit more free after the five weeks of the summer break, having time to recover and come stronger after my injury. It is nice mostly to ride a bike that feels like mine. For the moment it is only day one, we won’t get excited too much, but I am happy to finish the first day with this result.”

“A great start for John,” Team boss Max Biaggi confirmed. “He managed to get a time very close to the absolute record, breaking away decisively from his most direct chaser in the standings. We will enjoy this Friday and continue to work to confirm John’s achievements.”