Miguel Oliveira was in the lead and finished FP1 of the Portuguese GP in eighth place.

Miguel Oliveira started the Portuguese MotoGP Grand Prix with an eighth place in the first free practice session. The Trackhouse Racing rider was consistently one of the top ten fastest in the opening session in Portimão, even leading at one point.

With his first flying lap, #88 was briefly in second place, but as he didn’t improve immediately, he quickly dropped down the standings and ended up outside the top 15. On his fourth flying lap, he improved his time to move up to fifth.

This situation didn’t last long, as Oliveira then lost several positions again to drop to 12th. In response, he entered the 1m42s to reach seventh. However, when he entered the pits on the following lap, he had dropped back to eighth. There were 29 minutes left until the checkered flag.

The stay in the garage lasted about five minutes, enough time for Oliveira to fall to 11th in the standings. On his second attempt, he climbed to fourth place in a classification led at the time by Jack Miller (Red Bull KTM). And, not long after, it was Oliveira himself who briefly occupied the top position of the table, before being dethroned by Marc Márquez (Gresini/Ducati). He returned to the pits shortly after, when he was in second place and there were 11 minutes left. In the last five minutes, Oliveira was back on track, but he couldn’t improve his time. He dropped in the standings and finished eighth, 0.623s behind Márquez, who set the pace.