Johann Zarco smashed Enea Bastianini’s Le Mans lap record he posted on Friday to lead the way in FP3, the home hero leading factory Ducati pilot Francesco Bagnaia by 0.031s.
The large majority of the session saw little action in terms of time improvement as the field focussed on performing race runs on the soft-compound tyre, with only Takaaki Nakagami and Jorge Martin electing to post fast laps at around mid-distance after struggling on Friday.
Fabio Quartararo was the first man to light up the timing screens though as he fired in a stunning 1:30.847s tour with just under ten minutes to go to shave over three tenths-of-a-second from Bastianini’s Friday benchmark, a time that looked unbeatable for a moment.
Bagnaia though somehow managed to find another quarter-of-a-second to post a 1:30.568s, lapping around six-tenths faster than Bastianini’s lap record from Friday afternoon.
Zarco meanwhile posted several improvements in the last portion of the test as he battled to remain within the top ten in order to secure an automatic Q2 berth, though on his last effort he managed to find good time in the final sector to snatch the lap record for himself with a 1:30.537s, a gambit that would not be beaten in the final seconds.
Bagnaia followed just behind ahead of Quartararo, who managed to close to within 0.145s of Zarco’s effort at the death, while Marc Marquez utilised the tow from the reigning MotoGP world champion to score the fourth best time.
Jack Miller completed the top five on the sister factory Ducati, while Aleix Espargaro and Takaaki Nakagami improved late on to end up sixth and seventh overall on their Aprilia and LCR Honda machines respectively.
Alex Rins was eighth for Suzuki ahead of Pol Espargaro’s Honda – the Spaniard making it into Q2 despite an earlier crash at Turn 7 – while Jorge Martin’s tenth-best effort in FP3 was not enough to secure him a guaranteed pole shootout spot due to Bastianini’s Friday time just keeping him within the top ten.
This left Martin 11th just ahead of the other Aprilia of Maverick Vinales, while Joan Mir could muster up only the 13th best effort – leaving him with work to do in Q1 on Saturday afternoon.
KTM’s difficult weekend continued as Brad Binder was the highest classified of its riders in a lowly 15th just ahead of top rookie Marco Bezzecchi, while the other Yamaha pilots also struggled with Franco Morbidelli in 19th just clear of RNF Racing M1 man Andrea Dovizioso.
Keyword: Zarco shatters Le Mans lap record to lead Bagnaia in French GP FP3