Factory Aprilia's Max Biaggi set the fastest time in this morning's opening World Superbike free practice session at Brno but was kept honest right at the end of the hour by John Hopkins.
Stiggy Honda's Hopkins set the second quickest time of 2'01.399 with his last lap and was only 0.046s off the Italian's pace. His lap bumped Ben Spies down to third place with Michel Fabrizio rounding out a theoretical front row.
Biaggi led for a majority of the session and his first set of flying laps found a 2'01.375 which was good enough until the Italian bettered that time, dropping to a 2'01.353 that was never topped.
He was chased hard by team-mate Shinya Nakano for the first 15 minutes before Fabrizio popped into second with a 2'01.958. Ten Kate Honda's Ryuichi Kiyonari then set a time good enough for third on a 2'02.107.
Kiyo then bettered his time on the half hour to a 2'02.043 before he was pushed back to fourth by the DFX Ducati of Lorenzo Lanzi who went one one-hundredth of a second quicker.
With ten minutes remaining, Fabrizio came back to second with a 2'01.616 and was joined in the top three by BMW's Ruben Xaus, lapping in 2'01.881. Sterilgarda Yamaha's Spies had been hovering around eighth spot but came up to second with five minutes remaining.
A minute later, Xaus's team-mate Troy Corser put in a lap quick enough for fourth before Hopkins challenged Biaggi for the lead. Jonathan Rea was the leading British rider in 11th, Shane Byrne finished 16th, Leon Haslam three places further back and Tom Sykes was 21st.
