Sam Lowes emerged quickest at the conclusion of Friday's action for the Moto2 World Championship at Jerez, though it was Pedro Acosta looking most consistent in a crash-heavy afternoon.

With rising temperatures on Friday afternoon preventing all but two back-of-the-field riders from improving their lap times from the more ambient morning session, with tomorrow's all-important P3 outing taking place at 9am, most were content with spending the P2 session perfecting their race set-up.

As such, Lowes' fastest time of 1m 41.170s on the Marc VDS Racing bike stood the test of P2, the Briton looking impressive with a +0.230s margin over the competition, even if his afternoon did come to a premature end with a slow get-off at Turn 2.

Somkiat Chantra followed up in third on the Honda Team Asia machine and third place man Alonso Lopez on the SpeedUp Boscoscuro.

Of the frontrunners though it was title contender Acosta that demonstrated the most ominous pace, the 2021 Moto3 World Champion lapping consistently in the morning between his 1m 41.497secs lap - which was good enough for fourth - while he was quickest in the afternoon in isolation too, despite a fall early on in the session.

Competing at his GasGas team's home round, Jake Dixon enjoyed a positive start to the weekend as he looks to get over the disappointment of his COTA warm-up lap faux pas, while Albert Arenas managed to get up to sixth overall despite three crashes over the course of the day.

COTA pole sitter Celestino Vietti was seventh best on the Fantic Racing bike, ahead of Aron Canet, who - along with Pons Wegow Los40 team-mate Sergio Garcia - was another to hit the deck.

Barry Baltus carried his good form from COTA through to hold down ninth overnight, just ahead of championship leader Tony Arbolino.

Though lap times are expected to be considerably better in the morning, the remaining Q2 place holders were Filip Salac - who curiously stopped with a technical issue at exactly the same time as his QJMOTOR Gresini team-mate Jeremy Alcoba came to a halt with his own problems - Joe Roberts, Ai Ogura and Fermin Aldeguer.

Meanwhile, those with work to do on Saturday morning include Manuel Gonzalez on the VR46 Yamaha MasterCamp bike and COTA podium winner Bo Bendsneyder down in 21st.

Of the remaining Brits, Rory Skinner suffered a nasty fall at Turn 11 en route to 25th, though he was able to walk away.

CLICK HERE for full Spanish Moto2 Practice, Qualifying and RACE RESULTS from Jerez

Spanish Moto2 | Practice 2 Results [P1 + P2 Combined]

Jerez | Conditions - Dry, Hot