Bradley Smith’s excellent form continued yesterday when he posted the fastest time in a MotoGP test in Spain.

The Yamaha Tech3 rider, from Forest Hill, near Oxford, recorded a strong fifth place in Sunday’s race at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya.

And he followed it up 24 hours later with a hot lap of 1min 42.018secs in the test session, which was ended early by torrential rain.

Reigning world champion Marc Marquez, who is only a point ahead of Smith in the standings, was fourth fastest, while the Oxfordshire rider was almost two-thirds of a second quicker than teammate Pol Espargaro in eighth.

The nearest challengers were Suzuki pair Maverick Vinales and Aleix Espargaro.

Smith said: “It was a really interesting test for us and I’m pleased with the outcome.

“It was very short at just 18 laps, but I knew that I had to get out on track early because we were aware that the rain was coming in the afternoon.

“We completed 90 per cent of our work, as we weren’t expecting a long test.

“The lap time was OK considering the cooler track temperature in the morning, but I feel happy that we’ve made a good step forward.”

Next up for Smith and the rest of the MotoGP grid is the eighth round of the season, at Assen in the Netherlands on June 27.