MotoGP Indianapolis: Valentino Rossi fastest in first practice
Valentino Rossi led the way as the MotoGP field acclimatised to the revised Indianapolis road course in Friday morning practice
This weekend's grand prix is MotoGP's first appearance at the track since it was reconfigured for IndyCar's debut on the Indianapolis infield circuit in May.
Times were immediately much quicker than had been the case on the previous, tighter, layout, with Rossi's benchmark 1m34.535s on his Yamaha 3.4 seconds up on the 2013 pole and 6.2s quicker than the best opening practice time 12 months ago.
Rossi emerged on top after a late exchange of positions with Italian compatriot Andrea Iannone's Pramac Ducati.
Iannone - who will next year - beat Rossi's previous time by two tenths in the final minutes.
But Rossi responded and went 0.044s quicker than Iannone, before Bradley Smith stuck his Tech 3 Yamaha between the two Italians with a lap 0.034s off Rossi.
Championship leader Marc Marquez was back in fifth, 0.350s off the pace and behind Smith's team-mate Pol Espargaro.
Marquez had led much of the session by a comfortable margin before Rossi demoted him going into the last five minutes, kicking off a run of late improvements.
Jorge Lorenzo was sixth, ahead of Scott Redding on Gresini's production Honda.
Dani Pedrosa was only 16th on the second works Honda as he conserved tyres.
Another underdog to fly was local favourite Colin Edwards, who got as high as fourth late on before being pushed down to 11th.
With Edwards retiring after 2014, this weekend will be his last home race, and rumours continue that he will call a halt to his farewell season early.
Edwards is the only American in the field this weekend as Nicky Hayden has been sidelined by surgery on an old arm injury.
Hayden's replacement Leon Camier was at the tail of the field as he settled in on the Aspar Honda.
Pos Rider Team/Bike Time Gap 1. Valentino Rossi Yamaha 1m34.535s 2. Bradley Smith Tech 3 Yamaha 1m34.569s +0.034s 3. Andrea Iannone Pramac Ducati 1m34.579s +0.044s 4. Pol Espargaro Tech 3 Yamaha 1m34.678s +0.143s 5. Marc Marquez Honda 1m34.885s +0.350s 6. Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha 1m35.084s +0.549s 7. Scott Redding Gresini Honda 1m35.122s +0.587s 8. Aleix Espargaro Forward Yamaha 1m35.283s +0.748s 9. Andrea Dovizioso Ducati 1m35.445s +0.910s 10. Yonny Hernandez Pramac Ducati 1m35.501s +0.966s 11. Colin Edwards Forward Yamaha 1m35.743s +1.208s 12. Cal Crutchlow Ducati 1m35.935s +1.400s 13. Hiroshi Aoyama Aspar Honda 1m35.953s +1.418s 14. Stefan Bradl LCR Honda 1m35.972s +1.437s 15. Karel Abraham Cardion Honda 1m35.995s +1.460s 16. Dani Pedrosa Honda 1m36.419s +1.884s 17. Alvaro Bautista Gresini Honda 1m36.436s +1.901s 18. Hector Barbera Avintia FTR-Kawasaki 1m36.444s +1.909s 19. Broc Parkes PBM-Aprilia 1m36.445s +1.910s 20. Danilo Petrucci Ioda Aprilia 1m36.837s +2.302s 21. Michael Laverty PBM-Aprilia 1m38.399s +3.864s 22. Mike di Meglio Avintia FTR-Kawasaki 1m38.405s +3.870s 23. Leon Camier Aspar Honda 1m39.962s +5.427s
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