Gresini's Marco Simoncelli led the way in Thursday’s first practice session ahead of the Dutch TT. With a best lap time of 1:49.036 as rain fell at Assen, the Italian was ahead of Ducati’s Valentino Rossi and the Honda of championship leader Casey Stoner, with a number of changes atop the timesheets in the final few seconds.
The opening session was rain-affected for its duration, although Simoncelli still ended the period close to four tenths of a second quicker than anybody. For this weekend, team-mate Hiroshi Aoyama switches to the works Honda squad as substitute for Dani Pedrosa, and ended this first phase in 12th place as his own replacement at Gresini – Kousuke Akiyoshi – was 16th.
Despite breaking his collarbone only a fortnight ago at Silverstone, Britain’s Cal Crutchlow ran amongst the leading trio for Tech3 Yamaha and eventually finished sixth behind Andrea Dovizioso and reigning Champion Jorge Lorenzo. In seventh, Karel Abraham kept up his run of good fortune for the Cardion AB squad as Americans Edwards, Hayden and Spies rounded out the top ten.
Second practice in The Netherlands begins at 2:10pm local time (BST 1)
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| Pos. | Driver | Team | Time | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. |  M. Simoncelli | Gresini | 01:49.036 | 17 |
| 2. | V. Rossi | Ducati | 01:49.396 | 18 |
| 3. | C. Stoner | Repsol Honda | 01:49.527 | 12 |
| 4. | A. Dovizioso | Repsol Honda | 01:49.640 | 17 |
| 5. | J. Lorenzo | Fiat Yamaha | 01:49.995 | 12 |
| 6. | C. Crutchlow | Tech 3 | 01:50.386 | 13 |
| 7. | K. Abraham | Cardion AB | 01:50.413 | 20 |
| 8. | C. Edwards | Tech 3 | 01:50.968 | 15 |
| 9. | N. Hayden | Ducati | 01:51.277 | 16 |
| 10. | B. Spies | Fiat Yamaha | 01:51.590 | 15 |
| Full results | ||||
| Marco Simoncelli | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| More Marco Simoncelli photos | |||
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