Marc Marquez set a new weekend benchmark to take control of Saturday morning MotoGP practice at Silverstone.

The Spaniard hit the front early on and, after briefly trading fastest laps with Jorge Lorenzo and Stefan Bradl, settled issues when he got down to a 2m02.485s.

Lorenzo also improved on his sub-lap-record Friday pace to end the session in second, just over one tenth of a second down on Marquez.

He was the only Yamaha man to make the top five, with Valentino Rossi down in sixth and Cal Crutchlow suffering a disastrous, crash-hit session.

The Briton suffered a huge crash in the opening minutes at Maggotts, writing off his Tech 3 bike and prompting a visit to the medical center. He was passed clear to return to action at the halfway point and slowly worked his way back up to speed, only to drop his bike again at Vale as the session ticked into the final minutes.

Dani Pedrosa was also a conspicuous absentee from the top order – he ended the session 10th overall but his session was at least devoid of any of Crutchlow’s dramas. In his absence it was LCR Honda’s Bradl who carried the fight to factory Honda and Yamaha men Marquez and Lorenzo, ending within two tenths of a second of the pair.

Honda had another top four representative in the shape of Gresini’s Alvaro Bautista, while Ducati’s Andrea Dovizioso beat Rossi to fifth.

Aleix Espargaro once again set the CRT pace, finishing directly ahead of Pedrosa and Bradley Smith in ninth. Smith failed to crack the combined practice top 12 and will have to compete in the first Q1 shootout.

Michael Laverty, the third Briton on the grid, joined Crutchlow in the gravel, with PBM teammate Yonny Hernandez also crashing twice.

Pos  Rider             Team/Bike             Time       Gap 1.  Marc Marquez      Honda                 2m02.485s 2.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha                2m02.654s  +0.169s 3.  Stefan Bradl      LCR Honda             2m02.673s  +0.188s 4.  Alvaro Bautista   Gresini Honda         2m02.773s  +0.288s 5.  Andrea Dovizioso  Ducati                2m03.213s  +0.728s 6.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha                2m03.285s  +0.800s 7.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati                2m03.378s  +0.893s 8.  Cal Crutchlow     Tech 3 Yamaha         2m03.403s  +0.918s 9.  Aleix Espargaro   Aspar Aprilia         2m03.464s  +0.979s10.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda                 2m03.581s  +1.096s11.  Bradley Smith     Tech 3 Yamaha         2m03.892s  +1.407s12.  Andrea Iannone    Pramac Ducati         2m04.073s  +1.588s13.  Colin Edwards     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  2m04.542s  +2.057s14.  Hector Barbera    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  2m04.620s  +2.135s15.  Randy de Puniet   Aspar Aprilia         2m04.781s  +2.296s16.  Michele Pirro     Pramac Ducati         2m05.441s  +2.956s17.  Danilo Petrucci   Ioda-Suter-BMW        2m05.609s  +3.124s18.  Hiroshi Aoyama    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  2m05.844s  +3.359s19.  Claudio Corti     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  2m05.893s  +3.408s20.  Yonny Hernandez   PBM Aprilia           2m06.391s  +3.906s21.  Michael Laverty   PBM-Aprilia           2m06.752s  +4.267s22.  Lukas Pesek       Ioda-Suter-BMW        2m08.125s  +5.640s23.  Bryan Staring     Gresini FTR-Honda     2m08.178s  +5.693s