Ducati rider Jack Miller leads the practice session of the first session of the Japanese Grand Prix, round sixteen of the MotoGP World Championship 2022 season.
The Australian clocked a time of 1.44.509 minutes, ahead of his teammate Francesco Panaya by just 0.028 seconds, while Yamaha rider Fabio Quartararo was content with only 0.048 seconds in third place.
The session was under threat of rain, but was completely dry despite the clouds, which is the first time that the championship returns to Japan since 2019, when the 2020-2021 season race was canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Quartararo led the overall standings for the start of the session, and continued on to pole position when the race controller flashed the rain flags, but fortunately the rain was light and ended quickly.
Pramac Racing rider Johan Zarko topped the session following using Soft tyres, as Honda wildcard Tetsuta Nagashima opened the accident record.
Aprilia rider Alex Espargaro then used soft tires and managed to snatch the lead from Zarco, and then Suzuki rider Alex Rins led the session.
Miller then topped the session with 4 minutes remaining, ahead of Marc Marquez in second place, followed by Bastianini slipping off his bike at Turn 5 in the last minute.
And the accident record did not end there, as Zarco slipped off his bike too in Turn Seven, but fortunately none of them were injured.
Fourth place went to Alex Espargaro, ahead of Luca Marini in fifth, Marquez in sixth, Paul Espargaro in seventh, Brad Bender in eighth, Miguel Oliveira in ninth and Maverick Vinales in tenth.
