Monster Yamaha Tech3 team riders Pol Espargaro confidently concluded the first day at the Cataluña circuit as he looks to impress at his home Grand Prix on Sunday. The young Spaniard launched straight into gear when the event got underway and completed the opening shakedown impressively in 4th. In the afternoon session, he continued the setup work on his Yamaha YZR-M1 as the track temperature increased at the physically demanding circuit. His time from free practice one leaves Espargaro in 13th in the combined standings, but only 0.513 of a second from 4th and he now intends to up his pace tomorrow morning ahead of the all-important qualifying shootout.

On the other side of the pit box, Bradley Smith methodically began to set up his Yamaha YZR-M1 for the 23 lap sprint as he aims to follow up his strong result at the previous round in Mugello with another determined performance on Sunday. The 25 year old tirelessly completed 20 laps in the morning session, more than another other MotoGP rider, and finished less than a second back from third. Smith got straight back into the groove in FP2 as he carried on the vital setup work whilst he sampled the various compounds of Michelin tyres. His personal best from FP1 leaves him in 16th overall and with a firm plan of action in place for tomorrow, where the young Briton will seek to bounce back strongly and seal a top tier grid position.

Pol Espargaro - Position: 13th Time: 1'42.709 Laps: 33

"Overall today was a positive opening to the weekend. The fourth position this morning showed that we are working in the right direction, but unfortunately I had a very strange feeling with my front tyre on the last run during the second session. As a result, this afternoon so we weren't able to lower the lap time as much as we expected to. I think it was just this tyre, because we used the same compound before and it was working ok, but of course, if things like this have to happen, it's better that they occur on Friday and not later in the weekend. However, overall my feeling with the bike was good even though the grip level wasn't high, but that's the same for everybody. Now I'm focusing on tomorrow morning's session, which is the most important one for us and where my aim is to definitely pass straight through to QP2 so that I can get a strong qualifying position for my home GP on Sunday."

Bradley Smith - Position 18th Time: 1'43.470 Laps: 40

 "I think it’s been a bit of a tricky start for everyone in Cataluña today. We had three types of compound for both the front and rear so we wanted to try as many as possible. However, it looks like some of the compounds were a bit too soft for this conditions, and now it looks like we will have to use the harder option for the race and the rest of the weekend. As a result of assessing the tyres, we haven’t found the optimum chassis setting at the moment, because with sampling all the tyres, you have a different feeling and feedback and it’s time consuming. However, I am comfortable on the bike but we need to focus on the front turning for tomorrow and it’s a small change but it makes a big difference because there are a lot of high-speed corners at this racetrack. In addition, we also need to improve our corner speed. Overall, the bike balance is ok as well as the rear grip. We will analyse everything further tonight, but we currently have two clear options that we want to try tomorrow with bike one and two, anyway we are certain that we can lower the lap time and get back inside the top ten."