Dani Pedrosa set a commanding fastest time in second free practice for MotoGP’s Malaysian Grand Prix at Sepang.

Having seen his 2013 world championship hopes effectively ended by his incident with Honda teammate Marc Marquez in the last race at Aragon, Pedrosa began the Malaysian weekend with a point to prove.

Already fastest in morning practice, his 2m00.554s lap near the end of the second session was close to record pace. It put Pedrosa 0.553 second ahead of Marquez, who had previously gone half a second clear of the pack halfway through the session.

A late lap from Tech 3 Yamaha’s Cal Crutchlow got the Briton up to third, ahead of works stablemate Valentino Rossi, whose title-chasing teammate Jorge Lorenzo was only sixth.

The factory Yamahas were split by Gresini Honda rider Alvaro Bautista. The Spaniard had been quickest of all for the first 20 minutes before being deposed by Marquez, and later crashed at Turn 4.

Nicky Hayden was the only other man to have an incident, sliding into the gravel at the final corner but managing to make it back to the Ducati pits. He ended up seventh.

Aleix Espargaro led the CRT field in 11th place, with both Pramac Ducatis trailing him.

Pos  Rider             Team/Bike             Time       Gap      Laps 1.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda                 2m00.554s           17 2.  Marc Marquez      Honda                 2m01.087s  +0.533s  17 3.  Cal Crutchlow     Tech 3 Yamaha         2m01.423s  +0.869s  17 4.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha                2m01.538s  +0.984s  18 5.  Alvaro Bautista   Gresini Honda         2m01.659s  +1.105s  13 6.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha                2m01.710s  +1.156s  14 7.  Stefan Bradl      LCR Honda             2m01.727s  +1.173s  17 8.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati                2m02.373s  +1.819s  15 9.  Andrea Dovizioso  Ducati                2m02.487s  +1.933s  1410.  Bradley Smith     Tech 3 Yamaha         2m02.551s  +1.997s  1811.  Alex Espargaro    Aspar Aprilia         2m02.610s  +2.056s  1312.  Andrea Iannone    Pramac Ducati         2m02.819s  +2.265s  1813.  Hector Barbera    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  2m03.225s  +2.671s  1514.  Colin Edwards     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  2m03.707s  +3.153s  1715.  Yonny Hernandez   Pramac Ducati         2m03.780s  +3.226s  1616.  Randy de Puniet   Aspar Aprilia         2m03.922s  +3.368s  1617.  Hiroshi Aoyama    Avintia FTR-Kawasaki  2m04.414s  +3.860s  1818.  Claudio Corti     Forward FTR-Kawasaki  2m04.807s  +4.253s  1319.  Danilo Petrucci   Ioda-Suter-BMW        2m04.965s  +4.411s  1920.  Michael Laverty   PBM-Aprilia           2m05.551s  +4.997s  1421.  Luca Scassa       Cardion Aprilia       2m05.598s  +5.044s  1622.  Bryan Staring     Gresini FTR-Honda     2m06.538s  +5.984s  1723.  Lucas Pesek       Ioda-Suter-BMW        2m07.024s  +6.470s  1524.  Damian Cudlin     PBM Aprilia           2m07.122s  +6.568s  13