2012 IRTA Moto2 Jerez Test Day 1 Times - Luthi Dominates, Marquez Makes Successful Return

Thomas Luthi was the fastest Moto2 rider on the first day of the final test ahead of the season opener at Qatar. The Interwetten rider was fast all day long, with few riders capable of matching his pace. Italtrans' Takaaki Nakagami ended in 2nd, the Japanese rider continuing to impress throughout testing, and finishing ahead of his teammate Claudio Corti, while Pons HP Tuenti's Pol Espargaro ended just a hundredth of a second slower than Corti.

2011 Moto2 runner up Marc Marquez finally removed some of the question marks that had been hanging over his head, returning to test in public for the first time since the surgery to repair the double vision the Spaniard suffered as a result of the crash during practice at Sepang. The Repsol man took a few laps to get up to pace, but was up inside the top ten in the afternoon, and ended with the 5th fastest time, inside a half a second of fastest man Luthi. Given the massive amount of testing Marquez has missed, to be up to speed so quickly - Marquez told MotoGP.com that it was "like riding for the first time again" - is impressive.

Testing concluded early for many of the riders, as they ran out of miles on their official Moto2 engines. The official engines, prepared by Geo Technologies, have to last for duration of this test and the first two race weekends, limiting the riders to about 500 km per day. So although everyone is now using the same engines - no more excuses for teams claiming to use stock engines, or extra fast times for teams using more powerful Supersport-spec engines - the teams are following specific test strategies, meaning that some riders have yet to start chasing lap times. Come Wednesday night, however, that excuse will no longer fly, and the real strength of the different teams and riders should be revealed.

Testing continues tomorrow, with the weather expected to be excellent all week long.

Results from Day 1, courtesy of MotoGP.com: