TAKA SHOWS HIS POTENTIAL ON DAY ONE AT MUGELLO

LCR Honda IDEMITSU rider Takaaki Nakagami made an encouraging start to the Italian Grand Prix as free practice got underway at a sunny Mugello on Friday. The Japanese star finished the day in 7^th position on the timesheets and looks on track to progress directly to Q2 when the MotoGP class reconvene for qualifying on Saturday.

Arriving on the back of three successive top-10 finishes, Taka again demonstrated the potential to challenge at the front of the field at what is one of his favourite circuits. The LCR man ended FP1 in 11^th spot, but he improved by over a second in FP2 to comfortably break into the top 10 and is confident about his chances this weekend.