Valencia World Supersport: Craig Jones suffers big crash in Saturday free practice

Top Brit Craig Jones walked away from a high speed crash just minutes into the second free practice session this morning.

The 22-year-old tucked the front at the fast right kink before the hairpin mid way through the lap.

Although Craig Jones was able to walk away from the crash and get back out on track on his spare bike his Parkalgar Honda took a real battering. From the appearance of the machine it appears that the motorcycle picked up and cart wheeled through the gravel trap causing extensive damage to his number one bike.

Jones qualified on the provisional front row yesterday ended the session down in 11th place and will need to be back to top form in final qualifying this afternoon if he wants to maintain his place on the front row.

Speaking exclusively to MCN, Craig Jones said: “I’d done four laps at the start, came in and made a change an then I crashed a couple of laps later.

“It was a fast one through the right kink but I’m OK. I basically slid and tumbled a bit, but the bike is a lot worse.

“It was my number one bike with a higher spec engine so now we need to make a plan to see if we can get out on it in qualifying this afternoon or just concentrate on getting it ready for the warm-up and race tomorrow.”

It proved a difficult session for the rest of the Brits with Jonathan Rea down in 13th place, Chris Walker in 16th and Graeme Gowland in 29th after suffering a crash eight laps in.