Bastianini: ‘One of the best Fridays of my life’, but Quartararo ‘the strongest'

But even so, the future factory Lenovo Ducati rider does not believe he’s the favourite for Sunday’s race as it stands, instead awarding that tag to reigning MotoGP champion Fabio Quartararo. 

"One of the best Friday of my life. I’m happy about this," said Bastianini. "I think we have made a really good job today but we have to work, we have to still be concentrated.

"The other riders are really fast and especially on the [race] pace Fabio [Quartararo] is the strongest at the moment. On the time attack I made a good lap and I’m happy about this." 

On a day where Ducati riders once again dominated the top ten - Bastianini, Bagnaia, Jack Miller, Johann Zarco, Jorge Martin and Marco Bezzecchi all finished inside the top ten - automatic Q2 places for qualifying could already be set as the weather forecast for the remainder of the weekend appears very sketchy to say the least. 

With grip already low during FP1 which was in dry conditions, Bastianini believes rain could be an issue: "Yeah [the grip] was okay in FP2. In FP1 it was too low, especially in the first run but after many laps it was getting better. 

"We had some problem on the front of the start [of the lap] but in the end it was okay. For Sunday the track will be good if it’s not raining."

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Miller on form again for Ducati at Misano MotoGP

Another standout on day-one was Miller, who was quickest of the eight Ducati machines in FP1.

The Australian has been in stunning form ever since finding a set-up breakthrough at the Catalunya test, with only Bagnaia proving to have more consistency than him over the last few rounds.

Miller said: "The bike is working pretty good but the track is pretty bumpy. Every time we came in and out of the box we were able to improve the bike, improve my feeling, understand what we need to work on and which areas of the bike we need to improve. 

"It worked out well at the end and I’m really happy with the job today. The pace is there, the tyres are lasting really well. 

"The hard front was working well but we know that already. The only issue is whether we’re going to be able to use it for the rest of the weekend."

Pushed on whether this is the most settled period of his MotoGP career, Miller had no doubts about it.

"100%, We haven’t chased our tail. The bike is working week-in-week-out which has been nice and we’ve been to a lot of different tracks, a lot of different surfaces and not having to play with the geometry [of the bike] is good,” added the three-time MotoGP race winner. 

"You can focus more on doing what we did today with the tyres, with the laps, that kind of thing."