MotoGP Valencia: Rossi chases Iannone in third session

MotoGP Valencia: Rossi chases Iannone in third session

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MotoGP championship leader Valentino Rossi moved himself to second on the combined MotoGP free practice timesheets after the third session at Valencia this morning and dropped into the 1'30s bracket for the first time as he chased fellow Italian and works Ducati man Andrea Iannone who used his soft-tyre advantage to set the quickest lap of the weekend so far, a 1'30.925.MotoGP championship leader Valentino Rossi moved himself to second on the combined MotoGP free practice timesheets after the third session at Valencia this morning and dropped into the 1'30s bracket for the first time as he chased fellow Italian and works Ducati man Andrea Iannone who used his soft-tyre advantage to set the quickest lap of the weekend so far, a 1'30.925.Rossi began the session using the medium rear/aysmmetric front Bridgestone combination doing three short runs and then swapped to a medium/soft setup which garnered his 1'30.988. He put in 11 laps in the 1'31s on top of his 1'30 but didn't revisit the hard rear tyre he used yesterday to good effect. Rossi ended just 0.063s behind Iannone.Outgoing world champion Marc Marquez, who complained yesterday the front tyre options were too soft, put in a best of 1'31.034 on his 16th lap using a medium/medium setup and put in a whopping 13 1'31s laps over three runs but it is not clear yet whether his RC213V is overheating the front Bridgestone.Conversely, title challenger Jorge Lorenzo could only muster fifth place with a 1'31.146 and didnΓÇÖt better his time from yesterday after being held up on his fastest by Michele pirro. The Mallorcan completed nine laps in the 1'31s in three runs, trying first a medium/soft combination and then a medium aysmmetric.Britain's Bradley Smith upped his game massively to end one place ahead of Lorenzo on the sheets with a 1'31.134 and has good pace with ten laps in the 1'31s. Dani Pedrosa wasn't able to stitch together one perfect lap and ended down in sixth place. The Repsol Honda man managed a 1'31.163 and 11 laps in the 1'31s.Pol Espargaro, on the second Monster Yamaha, ended in seventh, one ahead of Andrea Dovizioso while Cal Crutchlow, who also asked for a harder compound front but didn't get it, and Danilo Petrucci were the last men to get a place in qualifying one by right. Aleix Espargaro and Hector Barbera ended in 11th and 12th with Maverick Vinales 13th.Scott Redding found eight-tenths of a second overnight to haul himself up to 19th place while Eugene Laverty ended in 23rd.- See more at: http://www.bikesportnews.com/news/news-detail/motogp-valencia-rossi-chases-iannone-in-third-session#sthash.6GkEwlwI.dpuf