Despite not setting a time in a damp morning session due to tricky track conditions, Movistar Yamaha MotoGP's Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi made a strong start to the Gran Premio d'Italia weekend. Eager to impress at their team's first home Grand Prix of the season, the teammates pushed hard in the afternoon to make up for lost time in the morning and secured second and sixth in the combined session times.

Movistar Yamaha MotoGP's Jorge Lorenzo and Valentino Rossi enjoyed their first day at the 'Autodromo del Mugello' track in the Tuscan sunshine in the afternoon and set some competitive lap times when the sun came out in the afternoon.

Lorenzo decided not to take any risks and remained seated in the Yamaha Factory Racing team's pit box during the FP1 session. What he missed in action in the morning, he made up for in the afternoon. The current leader of the championship made clear how much he loves the Mugello circuit, by setting multiple fast laps and challenging at the top of the standings throughout the FP2 session. He wrapped up the day in second place with a best lap of 1'48.157s, 0.461s from first.

Teammate Rossi had been looking forward to entertaining his home fans so much that not even the rainy weather conditions could stop him in the morning. He cleverly used the 45-minutes of free practice time to do eight practice starts from pit lane. However, as he immediately returned to the pits after each attempt, he did not set a time for the morning classification.

In the afternoon, the Doctor was able to start working on his settings. He worked on improving the balance of the bike and bettering his setting to suit the last sector of the demanding Mugello circuit. He set a best time of 1'48.340 and ended the day in sixth place, 0.644s from the front.

Massimo Meregalli - Movistar Yamaha MotoGP Team Director

"Though the conditions were not ideal, it was a good first day for us in Mugello. The morning session was damp, contrarily to what has been forecast for the rest of the weekend. For this reason we decided it was not necessary to go out to set a time in the morning, instead Vale used FP1 as an opportunity to test some solutions to perfect his starts and practiced them as he exited pit lane. When the sun came out in the afternoon, our hands were itching to begin work. We started in the right way for Jorge and the set up is working well for him. His pace is fast and consistent, even with an used tyre, and he is feeling good with the bike. Vale also booked progress throughout the afternoon session as he concentrated on bettering his race setting, especially on the second part of the track. There is some work to do, but we still have enough time before the race on Sunday."

Jorge Lorenzo - 2nd / 1'48.157 / 15 laps

"I set a 1'48.4s on the first run so that is a good lap time at this track on this bike with these tyres. In the last run, with the same tyres, I improved the lap time even more, so the feeling, starting with this setting, is good. Tomorrow, I think we can improve everything a little bit more and go faster."

Valentino Rossi - 6th / 1'48.340 / 20 laps

"It's always difficult here. Mugello is one of the best tracks but it's very demanding and scary, you have to be very courageous because it's very fast. It has a great layout but it's difficult to find the right setting. Unfortunately, we lost time this morning due to the weather and we are not OK with the balance of the bike, but for the first practice it was not so bad. The problem is that we are all very close so we have to improve, because especially in the last sector I'm not fast enough. This morning we didn't want to waste time and we had the chance to practice our starts, because this year we have some more problems with the clutch at the starts and we tried some different stuff, so at the end it was an important test."