Sepang MotoGP: Lorenzo edges out Pedrosa to top FP2

Lorenzo's best time came at the tail-end of a session dominated by Pedrosa, who became the first rider to dip beneath the 2m01s mark early on when he ousted Honda teammate Marc Marquez from the top spot with a 2m00.835s.

It wasn't until the last five minutes of the 45-minute session that Pedrosa's benchmark would be threatened, as Yamaha rider Lorenzo recorded the fastest lap of the weekend yet, a 2m00.246s, to snatch the top spot.

Pedrosa quickly responded, shaving half a second off his personal best to set a 2m00.369s, and had hooked up three outright best sectors on his next tour - only to lose time in the last sector and fall short of Lorenzo by 0.047s.

Marquez wound up third on a 2m00.472s, ahead of Ducati's Andrea Iannone, who suffered an early crash at Turn 8 before returning to the circuit on his number two bike to set the second best time, fading to fourth as the session wore on.

A late improvement by the Castrol-liveried LCR Honda of Cal Crutchlow saw the Brit slot into fifth, ahead of Aleix Espargaro on the best of the Suzukis and Andrea Dovizioso on the second Ducati.

Points leader Valentino Rossi suffered a dismal session, his best time of 2m01.305s coming on hard front and rear tyres midway through the session.

The Italian failed to improve when switching to the favoured medium tyres, losing time with a last-minute bike change, and languished over a second behind Lorenzo at the end of the session.

Danilo Petrucci (Pramac Ducati) and Scott Redding (Marc VDS Honda) completed the top 10.

Practice results:

Pos	Rider	Team	Bike	Time	Gap
1	Jorge Lorenzo	Movistar Yamaha MotoGP	Yamaha YZR-M1	2:00.246	2:00.246
2	Dani Pedrosa	Repsol Honda Team	Honda RC213V	2:00.293	+0.047
3	Marc Marquez	Repsol Honda Team	Honda RC213V	2:00.472	+0.226
4	Andrea Iannone	Ducati Team	Ducati Desmosedici GP15	2:00.486	+0.240
5	Cal Crutchlow	LCR Honda	Honda RC213V	2:01.039	+0.793
6	Aleix Espargaro	Team Suzuki ECSTAR	Suzuki GSX-RR	2:01.058	+0.812
7	Andrea Dovizioso	Ducati Team	Ducati Desmosedici GP15	2:01.127	+0.881
8	Valentino Rossi	Movistar Yamaha MotoGP	Yamaha YZR-M1	2:01.305	+1.059
9	Danilo Petrucci	Pramac Racing	Ducati Desmosedici GP14	2:01.598	+1.352
10	Scott Redding	Estrella Galicia 0,0 Marc VDS	Honda RC213V	2:01.607	+1.361
11	Maverick Viñales	Team Suzuki ECSTAR	Suzuki GSX-RR	2:01.796	+1.550
12	Hector Barbera	Avintia Racing	Ducati Desmosedici GP14	2:01.796	+1.550
13	Pol Espargaro	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	Yamaha YZR-M1	2:01.850	+1.604
14	Bradley Smith	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	Yamaha YZR-M1	2:02.101	+1.855
15	Stefan Bradl	Aprilia Racing Team Gresini	Aprilia RS-GP	2:02.118	+1.872
16	Eugene Laverty	Aspar MotoGP Team	Honda RC213V-RS	2:02.426	+2.180
17	Nicky Hayden	Aspar MotoGP Team	Honda RC213V-RS	2:02.427	+2.181
18	Yonny Hernandez	Pramac Racing	Ducati Desmosedici GP14	2:02.554	+2.308
19	Alvaro Bautista	Aprilia Racing Team Gresini	Aprilia RS-GP	2:02.626	+2.380
20	Mike di Meglio	Avintia Racing	Ducati Desmosedici GP14	2:03.480	+3.234
21	Jack Miller	LCR Honda	Honda RC213V-RS	2:03.485	+3.239
22	Toni Elias	Forward Racing	Yamaha Forward	2:03.710	+3.464
23	Loris Baz	Forward Racing	Yamaha Forward	2:03.731	+3.485
24	Anthony West	AB Motoracing	Honda RC213V-RS	2:04.892	+4.646
25	Damian Cudlin	E-Motion IodaRacing Team	ART	2:06.962	+6.716