First constructed in 1955 and now known as “The Cathedral” (how cool is that?), the TT Circuit Assen — located in Assen, Netherlands — is a 2.830-mile, 16-turn (eleven rights and six lefts) racetrack that will host this weekend’s Dutch TT race, an event that will draw a crowd of well over 100,000 European MotoGP fanatics.

The original Assen track was 17.75-miles in length and strung together in 1925. The first race, known as the Dutch Tourist Trophy, took place on the brick and asphalt country roads that ran through the sleepy towns of Schoonloo and Grolloo. Promoted and staged by the Motorclub Assen en Omstreken, the first winner of he Assen TT was Piet van Wijngaarden and his 500cc Norton.

84 years removed from that premier race, this Saturday, “The Cathedral” will host the 2009 Alice TT Assen and the historic and very storied venue kicked things off today by hosting the first practice session. In a shock result of sort, privateer upstart Randy De Puniet of the LCR Honda team stopped the clocks with a searing lap of 1:37.842 minutes, the fastest lap of the entire session. The flying lap was .005 a second faster than the Fiat Yamaha of reigning World Champion Valentino Rossi. The time came with 1:18 minutes remaining in the session and many insiders felt De Puniet’s lap would be taken down — and a number of riders certainly tried their best! — but in the end, the Playboy-backed pilot’s number stood tall atop the scoring monitors. As far as anyone could ascertain in Holland, it was the first time in the modern era that a non-works created motorcycle was the fastest machine in any sort of timed session.

And the time didn’t come easy as during the waning stages of the session, eleven motorcycles were all within .653 seconds. Third overall in the session with a lap of 1:37.8774 was Marlboro Ducati’s Casey Stoner. With a time of 1:38.0615, Fiat Yamaha's Jorge Lorenzo was fourth fastest on the day. A mere .031 faster than his teammate Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda's Andrea Dovizioso was fifth quickest. Dani Pedrosa slotted and Monster Yamaha Tech 3's Colin Edwards was seventh. Rizla Suzuki’s Chris Vermeulen was timed as the eight fastest rider, just ahead of Edwards' teammate James Toseland. Rizla Suzuki's Loris Capirossi rounded out the top10.

Thursday Practice:

1. Randy De Puniet (Honda) 1:37.842

2. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha) 1:37.847

3. Casey Stoner (Ducati) 1:37.877

4. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) 1:38.061

5. Andrea Dovizioso (Honda) 1:38.092

6. Dani Pedrosa (Honda) 1:38.194

7. Colin Edwards (Yamaha) 1:38.205

8. Chris Vermeulen (Suzuki) 1:38.350

9. James Toseland (Yamaha) 1:38.379

10. Loris Capirossi (Suzuki) 1:38.429

11. Alex De Angelis (Honda) 1:38.495

12. Nicky Hayden (Ducati) 1:38.928

13. Mika Kallio (Ducati) 1:39.464

14. Marco Melandri (Kawasaki) 1:39.597

15. Toni Elias (Honda) 1:39.642

Eric Johnson