FIM MotoGP World Championship Losail International Circuit Doha, Qatar April 7, 2012 Qualifying Results (all on Bridgestone tires): 1. Jorge LORENZO, Spain (YAMAHA), 1:54.634 2. Casey STONER, Australia (HONDA), 1:54.855 3. Cal CRUTCHLOW, Great Britain (YAMAHA), 1:55.022 4. Ben SPIES, USA (YAMAHA), 1:55.512 5. Nicky HAYDEN, USA (DUCATI), 1:55.637 6. Andrea DOVIZIOSO, Italy (YAMAHA), 1:55.858 7. Dani PEDROSA, Spain (HONDA), 1:55.905 8. Hector BARBERA, Spain (DUCATI), 1:55.983 9. Stefan BRADL, Germany (HONDA), 1:56.063 10. Karel ABRAHAM, Czech Republic (DUCATI), 1:56.198 11. Alvaro BAUTISTA, Spain (HONDA), 1:56.521 12. Valentino ROSSI, Italy (DUCATI), 1:56.813 13. Colin EDWARDS, USA (BMW-SUTER), 1:57.644 14. Randy DE PUNIET, France (APRILIA-ART), 1:58.266 15. Aleix ESPARGARO, Spain (APRILIA-ART), 1:58.520 16. Yonny HERNANDEZ, Colombia (KAWASKAI-BQR/FTR), 1:58.795 17. Michele PIRRO, Italy (HONDA-FTR), 1:59.085 18. Mattia PASINI, Italy (APRILIA-ART), 1:59.195 19. Danilo PETRUCCI, Italy (APRILIA-IODA/ART), 1:59.664 20. Ivan SILVA, Spain (KAWASAKI-BQR/FTR), 2:00.493 21. James ELLISON, Great Britain (APRILIA-PBM/ART), 2:00.757 More, from a press release issued by Speed Master Team: PASINI WILL START FROM THE SIXTH ROW FOR THE RACE AT LOSAIL CIRCUIT Today the MotoGP class had sixty minutes at disposal for the qualifying session of the Qatar Grand Prix. Pasini and his crew took advantage of most of the time to focus on a more traditional path for the setting and on the tyres choice, testing various possibilities that are available for this race for the rear and the front. Because of a small crash with no physical consequences, Mattia was forced to finish the session on the second bike, without having the chance to improve the position on the grid, ending with the eighteenth placement. Therefore the Italian will start from the sixth row tomorrow. Mattia Pasini #54 – 18th with 1’59.195 “Generally speaking today we did a good job. In the previous sessions we worked on some changes that maybe should have been done later on. Today we worked towards a more traditional direction, which helped us in improving. It’s a shame I crashed out: we put on a new front tyre, but probably it was too late. We ruined the last part of the session, I finished using the second bike, but it didn’t have exactly the same setting as bike n. 1. The race of tomorrow will be long and demanding, we’ll try to get into the pace lap after lap and do the best we can.” More, from a press release issued by Pramac Racing: HECTOR WILL START FROM THE THIRD ROW THE FIRST 2012 MOTOGP RACE Hèctor Barberà will kick off his third MotoGP campaign from the third row of the grid after a closely fought opening qualifying session of the 2012 season in Doha this evening. Hèctor registered the eight-best time in 1.55.982, behind Nicky Hayden, the only Ducati rider to finish the session ahead of the Spanishman. Tomorrow’s race is scheduled to run in 22-laps and it is the first in the 18-round World Championship that will conclude in Valencia on November. Hèctor Barberà Pramac Racing Team Rider “The assesment of these three days practices was strongly positive. Thanks to my team’s work we could be able to improve and understand both the track conditions and the behaviour of my Ducati’s machine on it. Probabily this week end of practices was been the most concreat and satisfying one of my MotoGp campaign. It’s a shame that i lost the second row only for one tenth of a second and, to be honest, it was my goal untill today. But now i have only to think about tomorrow’s race and i’m excited for it because i want to achieve a good position ahead the Ducati’s official riders.” Francesco Guidotti Pramac Racing Team Manager – “Today we had a good result but our idea was to achieve the second row. The tomorrow’s race will be certeinly fighting and unsure,but i’m convinced the Hector’ will be able to make a good game.” More, from a press release issued by Yamaha MotoGP Team: Lorenzo Delivers Perfect Pole in Qatar Yamaha Factory Racing rider Jorge Lorenzo made his 2012 intentions clear tonight scoring a scorching pole position at the Losail circuit for tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Qatar. The 2010 World Champion was on top form, pushing his YZR-M1 to the limit, taking full advantage of Bridgestone’s softer compound tyre to put himself 0.221 seconds clear of second place rider Casey Stoner. Lorenzo was also delighted to be joined on the front row by fellow Yamaha rider Cal Crutchlow. Teammate Ben Spies had also been delivering impressively quick laps on the softer tyre and was on target for a front row start until a fall minutes from the end of the session. The Texan was unhurt and walked away but had to settle for fourth and a second row start for tomorrow’s race with a best lap time of 1’55.512, 0.878 from pole. Jorge Lorenzo Position : 1st Time: 1’54.634 Laps: 23 “I am really happy with tonight’s result. I had to push more than 100% to make pole position but I pushed to the limit and managed to make a perfect lap. We still have to improve the power on the straight and our maximum speed but in the rest of the track the bike is working really well. Tomorrow will be a tough race and tyres will be very important I think. A big thank you to Yamaha and my team for giving me such a good bike!” Ben Spies Position : 4th Time: 1’55.512 Laps: 20 “We were on a good lap until the crash, I just lost the front. I’ve been complaining the last couple of days that the front end just didn’t have the right feeling that I wanted. As I was trying to get away from the bike when I was sliding something got caught up and I went with it. I was looking at the front wheel for a while and thought about trying to get back on when I couldn’t get away from it! We’ll try to make the bike better now, I know if we can fix it we can be up front. The M1 is clearly going round the track fast and I feel good on it apart from that. We’ve got some good ideas to try in warm up so we’ll see.” Wilco Zeelenberg Team Manager “A fantastic start to the season, last year we struggled many times to qualify well. Jorge delivered a great pole and was over two tenths quicker than Casey which is impressive. We have a good feeling and we’re looking forward to tomorrow to see what we can do.” Massimo Meregalli Team Director “There’s no better way to start the season than starting from pole, Jorge put in a really impressive lap. Despite the crash Ben managed to keep fourth place on the grid, second row is not so bad. We’ll work a bit more tonight to try to fix one area with the front and in the warm up we hope to get the feeling we are looking for. If all that comes together we have all the conditions for a good race.” More, from a press release issued by LCR Honda: DAZZLING PERFORMANCE FOR BRADL AT QATAR GP QUALIFYING Losail, 7th of April: the opening round of 2012 season continued today with the 60-minute qualifying session which decided the first starting grid of Qatar Grand Prix with Lorenzo, Stoner and Crutchlow in the front row ahead’s tomorrow 22-lap race. Stefan Bradl also demonstrated the rapid progress he is making in getting the best out of the impressive RC213V machine on soft rubber after he finished 9th quickest in his first qualifying session (1’56.063) aboard the Japanese machine. The 22-year champion will line up in the third row for the race which is scheduled at 10pm local time. Stefan: “Actually this is a good qualifying for us as our target was the third row. And when I looked at the time I realized were are close to P6 and this is good for the race. We lapped on many soft tyres probably more than the others, but for me it was not easy for me to use every single tyre. Initially you feel you can push more and more but you must focus on the right acceleration. We also improved the overall package and I am looking forward to race with the top riders and my target is to follow them and learn as much as possible”. More, from a press release issued by Repsol Honda: Grand Prix of Qatar Losail Date : 07/04/2012 Weather : Dry Temperature : Air: 26 degrees, Ground: 27 degrees Humidity : 31% Front row start for Stoner in Qatar World Champion Casey Stoner will start the Grand Prix of Qatar from the front row of the grid in second place, with team mate Dani Pedosa on the third row in seventh. It was a frustrating session for Casey who was once again plagued with chatter issues on his RC213V. He led for the majority of the session but in the end took second place with a 1’54.855 just 0.2 seconds off Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo. Dani also experienced issues during the one hour session. In his first stop in the garage to swap bikes, the second one failed to start and disrupted his session and momentum. He finished 7th with a time of 1’55.905. The Grand Prix of Qatar, the first race of the season will take place tomorrow at 22h00 local time, 21h00 CET. CASEY STONER 2nd 1’54.855 “I’m not really happy with how qualifying went for us, it should have been a lot better especially on the soft tyre which we hadn’t used all weekend. Last night we were happy with what we had improved and with the set up in general. Then tonight we tried to improve that set up and we just made it worse and worse. In the end we did a full circle and came back to what we had on Thursday night and we have huge chattering problems again. Now we have a lot of work to do to understand what’s gone wrong and where the problem is before tomorrow. If we can make a big step forward in warm up then we can challenge for a podium and maybe fight for the win, but if the bike remains as it is at the moment, then we were going to be in for a long hard race”. DANI PEDROSA 7th 1’55.905 “We solved a little the issues we had yesterday with the electronics, but we had other problems today. I stopped in the garage to change the bike and it didn’t start, twice. I lost a lot of time there and I had to take the other bike which I didn’t feel comfortable with either. It’s a shame. The team couldn’t do any better and nor me; from this point I lost the concentration a little and we couldn’t get a better position. Seventh on the grid is not a good place to start the race, but I hope that we don’t have any issues tomorrow and I can have a good race”. More, from a press release issued by Bridgestone: Lorenzo claims pole for Qatar season opener Round 1: Qatar MotoGP™ – Qualifying Practice Losail International Circuit, Saturday 7 April 2012 Bridgestone slick compounds available: Front: Soft, Medium & Extra-Hard; Rear: Medium, Hard (Asymmetric) Weather: Dry. Ambient 29-29°C; Track 30-29°C (Bridgestone measurement) Yamaha Factory Racing’s Jorge Lorenzo will start on pole at the first race of the 2012 MotoGP™ season after the Spaniard continued the strong form he showed in Free Practice to post a benchmark qualifying lap time of 1:54.634. Lorenzo traded places at the top of the timesheets with Repsol Honda’s Casey Stoner for most of the qualifying session, with the reigning champion ultimately falling short of his rival with a best time of 1:54.855 to finish in second place. Rounding out the top three was the ever-impressive Monster Tech3 Yamaha of Cal Crutchlow, the Brit’s time of 1:55.022 good enough to land him his first ever front-row start in MotoGP™. In the battle of the CRT riders NGM Mobile Forward Racing’s Colin Edwards took the honours with the Texan’s quickest lap of 1:57.644 placing him 13th overall. For the first half of qualifying most riders ran the harder rear tyre option until twenty minutes remaining in the session at which point the riders switched en masse to the softer asymmetric rear tyre in pursuit of a quick lap time. Track temperatures for qualifying stayed relatively warm at around 29°C though due to the wind, track conditions weren’t at their best for qualifying. The stage is now set for the first race of the season with the action set to start at 2200 local time (GMT+3). Shinji Aoki – Manager, Bridgestone Motorsport Tyre Development Department “Today was quite unusual as despite the warm track temperatures, conditions didn’t improve much from yesterday. Nevertheless it was an exciting qualifying session and I would like to congratulate all the riders on their performance in the first qualifying practice of the year and in particular, Jorge Lorenzo and the Yamaha Factory Racing team for taking pole position. “Once again the extra durability and stability offered by the extra-hard front tyre made it the popular choice for riders and I expect most riders to use this option for tomorrow’s race. Both the softer and harder rear options were used throughout qualifying, so we may see some different strategies for the race with the rear tyre. With our 2012 specification tyres working very well here in Qatar I am confident that we will have a good race tomorrow to commence the 2012 MotoGP™ season.” More, from a press release issued by Power Electronics Aspar: GP of Qatar – 07/04/12 – Losail Circuit – MotoGP Qualifying Practice POWER ELECTRONICS ASPAR READY TO RACE IN QATAR Randy De Puniet and Aleix Espargaró still looking for front-end feel but ready for the lights at Losail The first qualifying practice of the 2012 MotoGP World Championship took place late this evening at the Losail Circuit, where Cal Crutchlow and Ben Spies made the early running only to be overcome by the strength of title favourites Jorge Lorenzo and Casey Stoner. Lorenzo took the first pole of the season in 1’54.634 but it promises to be a close battle between the pair tomorrow night, whilst Crutchlow and Spies will both have their eye on the podium. POWER ELECTRONICS Aspar pair Randy De Puniet and Aleix Espargaró are both looking forward to start racing after a long preseason and some good results in practice here this weekend. The Frenchman and the Spaniard have worked hard on their machines, in particular in the search for more front-end feel, with De Puniet qualifying fourteenth fastest despite a fast crash in turn thirteen with twenty minutes of the session remaining and Aleix just one position behind him on tomorrow’s grid. 14th Randy De Puniet 1.58.266 (18 laps): “Qualifying actually went pretty well, I wasn’t put off by my crash yesterday and felt comfortable on the bike. I was the top CRT bike in the early part of the session but another crash spoiled that. It was a strange one because I lost the front when I wasn’t braking or accelerating so that gives us a bit to think about. We have to put it behind us as quickly as possible and make sure we are focused on the race tomorrow so we’ll look at the data tonight and prepare as best we can.” 15th Aleix Espargaró 1.58.520 (21 laps): “Looking at the first session compared to tonight the lap times have come down a lot and that gives us hope. I am not completely happy with the way qualifying went but overall it has been a good weekend so far and we have improved the bike in several areas although we still have work to do to reduce the chatter. It is rebounding a lot at full lean and if I try to pick the bike up too early it wants to crash. Apart from that I am happy with the performance of the ART.” More, from a press release issued by Monster Yamaha Tech 3: Crutchlow lights up Losail with maiden MotoGP front row Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team rider Cal Crutchlow lit up the Losail International Circuit tonight by storming to a sensational place on the front row of the grid for the opening round of the new 1000cc MotoGP World Championship. After finishing in a fantastic second position in practice last night, the 26-year-old delivered superbly when the pressure was on in the decisive final moments of qualifying to come close to snatching a dramatic pole position. The British rider, whose previous best qualifying result was sixth position in 2011, was in cont ention for the front row throughout an incident-packed 60-minute session. The former World Supersport champion was able to reel off fast and consistent times on the hard compound Bridgestone rear tyre in race trim before commencing his attack on soft tyres in the final 20 minutes. A stunning lap of 1.55.505 rocketed him into second position and at that stage he was just 0.090s behind reigning World Champion Casey Stoner. He briefly dropped back to third as Stoner and Jorge Lorenzo upped their pace, but Crutchlow wasn’t finished and he pushed his YZR-M1 1000cc to the limit to set an inspired lap of 1.55.022. That was only 0.029s off pole position in the closing stages and by the end of the session he was third, almost 0.5s clear of Ben Spies in fourth and only 0.388s away from Lorenzo’s impressive pole time of 1.54.634. Andrea Dovizioso played a major part in helping Yamaha enjoy a brilliant first qualifying session in the new 1000cc era, with the Italian sixth quickest. All four Yamaha YZR-M1 machines were inside the top six. Dovizioso secured his place on the second row of the grid thanks to a competitive time of 1.55.857, although changes to the set-up his YZR-M1 machine didn’t deliver the improve performance he had been expecting on soft tyres. The 26-year-old was still able to lap consistently inside the top six on both hard and soft compound Bridgestone tyres and he is confident he will be in the podium hunt in the 22-lap race. Cal Crutchlow 3rd 1.55.022 22 laps: “I’m really happy and I think we can go into the race now with a lot more confidence. It is a great feeling to be on the front row with Casey and Jorge because everybody is aware of how fast they are. It has felt like a long time coming to get a result like this but this is a fantastic reward for all the effort my Monster Yamaha Tech 3 crew put in over the winter. They worked with me a lot to help me learn how to ride in MotoGP and tonight is a great pay-off. I’m happy with my performance but fair play to Jorge because he did a phenomenal job and that’s an awesome lap time. But I always knew what I could do once we started putting the soft tyres in and I thought I’d have a crack at the front row. The big positive aside from my first front row in MotoGP is my race pace is going to be good enough to finish in the top six and that remains my goal. There’s no doubt we are getting the absolute maximum out of the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 package and all I will do tomorrow night is try my best. I’d say per lap I am three or four-tenths off the pa ce Casey and Jorge are capable of, but that’s a lot better than what it was last year.” Andrea Dovizioso 6th 1.55.858 25 laps: “Tonight didn’t go as well as I had hoped but it was a part of the learning process that we need to go through to improve for the future. I’m not going to be disappointed to finish sixth but I think we were a little bit unlucky tonight. I was a little bit inexperienced with the bike in the crucial final minutes of qualifying and we need to build a better understanding between the team and myself. But that is completely normal and we know we will get better. We made a modification to the bike from last night and unfortunately it didn’t give us the improvement we had anticipated, particularly with the soft tyres. I’m sure that for the race we will be quite a bit faster by switching back to the set -up of last night. I’m still full of optimism because my race pace on the hard tyres is not so far away from Lorenzo, but it is vital to start from as close to the front as possible because I think the tyres will lose grip quite quickly. The key will be to ride smooth to save the tyres and then we will see what happens in the final stages of the race.” More, from a press release issued by Blusens Avintia Racing: Yonny Hernández gets the fourth position among the CRTs in Qatar. Iván Silvá is ready for the race in spite of a few issues during the qualifying practice Avintia Blusens achieved a good result at the first MotoGP official training practices. Despite they haven’t got the chance to practice much before this first GP both Yonny Hernández and Iván Silvá have managed to catch up half the gap between them and their rivals during the pre-season. They have already proved on the occasion of the free training practices on Thursday and Friday that they were not far behind the best positions among the CRTs except De puniet and Edwards. Yonny has proved to be very active and fast throughout each and every practice and he crossed the finish on the sixteenth position and on the fourth among the CRTs at the first official training practices for him and for the Avintia Blusens MotoGP team. Iván Silvá has experienced more problems he even crashed and he did not manage to make it beyond the twentieth position on tomorrow’s starting grid. Even if he tried different options he did not manage to feel comfortable on his motorbike and he hopes that he will be able to sort a few issues so he can ride a better race tomorrow. Raúl Romero (Team Manager MotoGP): “I would like to stress that I am very excited by the work that is being done. Just realize that we are newcomers in the category and we are already close to the best ones. Colin and DePuniet are high-level and seasoned riders and both the Aprilia (on which some work has been done for years) and the Suter of Forward Racing which has been developed for over a year now are now standing much closer than expected. We have margin and time for improving. We are only a second behind such a great rider as Edwards and only half a second behind De Puniet and his fine Aprilia. I am glad. Yonny has been doing a great job and Iván won’t be any far from Yonny when he has sorted the problems he has experienced.” 68 Yonny Hernández (16º 1.58.795 + 4.161): “I am very glad. We have done a great job throughout the weekend and to be honest I didn’t expect to end up that close to the Aprilias in such a short time. If you had asked me back in Jerez, I would have answered it would be impossible for us to be that close. But the truth is we are that close and the bike is constantly improving. We have improved the front wheel with its rebounces and I have managed to be more competitive. The objective for tomorrow is to finish off the race and hit the third position among the CRTs.” 22 Iván Silvá (20º 2.00.493 +5.859): “It has been a complicated weekend. The work we have done so far has not been fruitful. I can´t feel comfortable with the bike and it seems that what had worked out fine in Jerez doesn’t work out anymore here. We have tried different options and none of them seem to suit my riding style. We will be working on and I hope I´ll do better tomorrow.” More, from a press release issued by Marlboro Ducati: Fifth-best time for Hayden in Qatar qualifying, Rossi twelfth The Desmosedici GP12 will start its debut Grand Prix on the second row tomorrow evening, with Ducati Team rider Nicky Hayden having posted a top-five time in tonight’s qualifying session at Qatar’s Losail International Circuit. Teammate Valentino Rossi, after a trio of progressively improving free-practice sessions, encountered setup problems that prevented him from doing better than twelfth place. While Nicky Hayden immediately felt at home with his bike’s setup and was able to log consistently good lap times even with the hard tyre, Valentino Rossi had a much different experience and didn’t find the same feeling that had enabled him to post better times on Friday. Nicky Hayden (Ducati Team) 5th (1:55.637) “Our goal tonight was to be in the top five, and I’m pleased that we achieved that. I did a 56.1 on a hard tyre and to be honest, I thought maybe I could do something really special with the soft, but all things considered, I think we did decently in our first qualifying session. We’ll see if we can come here and turn it into a result tomorrow night. Tyre life is going to be important, and since we’re using up the tyre a lot, we need to work on that. I still struggled a bit with chatter and understeer, especially in the fourth sector, where the corners are flat, but the GP12 is certainly the fastest Ducati I’ve ever ridden, which could come in handy in the race. I think it will be a hard race, but I’m really looking forward to it. There’s a big gap to the top two, but we’ll try our best to get a good start, get into that second group and fight like dogs to hold on. Hopefully we can leave here with something positive.” Valentino Rossi (Ducati Team) 12th (1:56.813) “Yesterday was nothing fantastic but a lot better, especially with the used tyre, so my goal was to qualify on the second row. I’m very far from that target though, as the problems that we had before were worse. It’s very strange because we only made some small changes from yesterday, but the feeling was very different. After that we returned to yesterday’s setting and I went a little bit faster, but it wasn’t enough to significantly improve the result. I’m not sure what to expect for the race, but obviously, I hope to do better. Nicky made a different setup choice than ours and did a good session with both tyres, so now we’ll also look at his data and try to do better.” More, from a press release issued by Honda: FIM MOTOGP WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 01 SATURDAY APRIL 7 DOHA, QATAR Weather: Warm Temperature: Ambient 26 degrees C / Track 27 degrees C STONER STARTS TITLE DEFENCE FROM FRONT ROW Casey Stoner (Repsol Honda RC213V) will begin the defence of his 2011 MotoGP World Championship from the middle of the front row after a hectic end to the one hour night qualifying session at the Losail International Circuit in Qatar. Stoner was one of only two riders to head the 21-rider MotoGP qualifying field for the first race of the 2012 championship, and by far the most dominant. But when the one-hour session ended, he was a narrow second to Yamaha rider Jorge Lorenzo. The 26-year-old Australian, whose clockwork precision led to ten victories last season, had a frustrating session. Every time he and the team made a change, the expected improvement in time was elusive. By the end of qualifying he had gone full circle without significantly improving his time, nor his motorcycle. Nor was he able to take full advantage of the softer rear tyre most riders used to set their fast qualifying times. That said, Stoner has an enviable record in Qatar-he has victories in four of the past five races, and poles in the last three races-and he can be expected to be in the mix for Sunday evening’s 10:00 p.m. opening race of the year. Team-mate Dani Pedrosa will start from the row three pole position after setting the seventh fastest time. Pedrosa had electrical issues on Friday and today he had further problems that forced him onto his backup bike. He said he was not comfortable on his second bike and lost concentration in the session, which resulted in a qualifying effort that was well below his standard. But the Spaniard was resolute that the worst of his problems are behind him and if he makes one of his trademark lightning starts he can quickly be part of the lead pack. Stefan Bradl (LCR Honda MotoGP RC213V) will start his first ever MotoGP race from the third row. The 2011 Moto2 World Champion made steady progress throughout his first weekend aboard the Honda RC213V, putting it all together early on. Bradl shot to the upper part of the time sheets early on, on the first of his four soft tyres, then concentrated on his race set-up. The young German might have bettered his time had he not been balked by a slower rider on his final lap. Spaniard Alvaro Bautista starts from row four in his MotoGP debut aboard the San Carlo Honda Gresini RC213V. Bautista concentrated on improving front end feel, never reaching the point of confidence. He was looking forward to tomorrow night’s warm-up session to test one last solution before heading into his first race as a Honda rider. San Carlo Honda Gresini rider Michele Pirro (FTR-Honda) was the fifth fastest of the new CRT set aboard his Honda CBR1000RR-powered FTR machine. Having had very little pre-season testing, Pirro and his team have a myriad of development issues to tackle this weekend. Figuring out the proper electronics package is a particularly daunting issue with so little track time, which is what held the young Italian back in tonight’s qualifying session. Swiss rider Thomas Luthi (Interwetten-Paddock, Suter) qualified on the Moto2 pole in Qatar. The former 125cc World Champion put in a very fast time on his second flying lap of the course, then spent the remainder of the session working on race set-up. The strategy turned out to be the right one, though there were some anxious moments at the end. Marc Marquez (Team CatalunyaCaixa Repsol, Suter) came within .072s of Luthi, with Speed Master rider Andrea Iannone (Speed Up) completing the front row only .037s behind Marquez. It was Marquez who nearly stole the pole position in his first qualifying session since last October’s Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island. Marquez was injured in practice for the following race in Malaysia, suffering vision problems that only recently cleared up. With less 2012 track time than most of his peers, Marquez made a remarkable return to nearly earn his first pole position of the year. Instead he will sit second on the grid to Luthi. Iannone gathered speed throughout the 45-minute session to clock his best time on his second to last flying lap. The Italian took one last run at the pole with his final run, though he was noto able to improve his time. Still, Iannone was encouraged by his race pace and the work that the team had done to get him ready for tomorrow night’s curtain-raiser. And also that he was able to put the Speed Up machine on the front row in its first race. Maverick Vinales will start the first ever Moto3 race from a tightly bunched front row aboard his Blusens Avintia FTR-Honda. The young Spaniard battled for pole throughout before finishing a shadow second; he was .016s off pole-sitter Sandro Cortese aboard his Honda 250cc four-stroke powered FTR. Despite that, he was confident that his race pace would make him a contender and was looking forward to the end of the race when he could put his talent to use on worn tyres. Louis Rossi (Racing Team Germany, FTR-Honda) will start next to Vinales at the end of the front row. The Frenchman was only .099s behind Vinales, with .115s covering the top three. Italian youngster Romano Fenati (Team Italia FMI, FTR-Honda) qualified on row two in his grand prix debut. MotoGP rider quotes Casey Stoner, Repsol Honda: 2nd 1m 54.855s “I’m not really happy with how qualifying went for us. It should have been a lot better, especially on the soft tyre which we hadn’t used all weekend. Last night we were happy with what we had improved and with the set-up in general. Then tonight we tried to improve that set-up and we just made it worse and worse. In the end we did a full circle and came back to what we had on Thursday night and we have huge chattering problems again. Now we have a lot of work to do to understand what’s gone wrong and where the problem is before tomorrow. If we can make a big step forward in warm-up then we can challenge for a podium and maybe fight for the win, but if the bike remains as it is at the moment, then we are going to be in for a long hard race.” Dani Pedrosa, Repsol Honda: 7th 1m, 55.905s “We solved a little the issues we had yesterday with the electronics, but we had other problems today. I stopped in the garage to change the bike and it didn’t start, twice. I lost a lot of time there and I had to take the other bike which I didn’t feel comfortable with either. It’s a shame. The team couldn’t do any better and nor me; from this point I lost the concentration a little and we couldn’t get a better position. Seventh on the grid is not a good place to start the race, but I hope that we don’t have any issues tomorrow and I can have a good race.” Stefan Bradl, LCR Honda MotoGP: 9th 1m, 56.063s “Actually this is a good qualifying for us as our target was the third row. And when I looked at the time I realised we are close to P6 and this is good for the race. We lapped on many soft tyres, probably more than the others, but for me it was not easy to use every single tyre. Initially you feel you can push more and more, but you must focus on the right acceleration. We also improved the overall package and I am looking forward to race with the top riders and my target is to follow them and learn as much as possible.” Alvaro Bautista, San Carlo Honda Gresini: 11th 1m, 56.521s “We have changed a lot of things without improving the bike and I still don’t have confidence in the front. We are a long way back on the grid which is never good, but we have the warm-up tomorrow to try to find a solution. Hopefully we can do that otherwise we are going to be on the back foot for the race, trying to finish it in the best shape possible. It is a shame and it’s strange because we were happy with preseason testing but here I just don’t have the feel. We’ll keep our heads up and keep fighting.” Michel Pirro, San Carlo Honda Gresini: 17th – 1m, 59.085s “There is not much to say tonight I went out on a hard tyre and did a 1’59, but I came in to change the electronics and we had problems from that point on. Unfortunately we still have a long way to go and the electronics are going to take a lot of work. Tomorrow in the warm-up we will try to work out what is slowing us down and I am sure we can have a good race.” Moto2 rider quotes Thomas Luthi, Interwetten Paddock-Suter: Pole position 2m, 0.187s “The weekend was great so far. We had quite a good practice. I mean the last IRTA test already went very well in Jerez. We had a good pacing of the bike and actually we could improve even one more step here in Qatar. And, yeah, we look forward to the race. All the other guys are close to me and I think it will be, yeah, like we are used to Moto2 races. But the base is good, I feel confident and just push as hard as I can.” Marc Marquez, Team CatalunyaCaixa Repsol-Suter: 2nd 2m, 0.259s “To tell the truth, this session went better than we were expecting. We have been looking for the best setting and getting more kilometres under our belts throughout the weekend and we found an improvement. We have been working with the race in mind, although in the warm-up we will be trying out a couple more things. I think that we’ve done a great job, because I wasn’t expecting to be on the front row. We will be going out to enjoy the race tomorrow, because even though I don’t have the pace that the others do, we will still be giving 100% and trying to take as many points as possible.” Andrea Iannone, Speed Master-Speed Up: 3rd 2m, 0.296s “I can say that this was a positive day. I’m happy because we got the Speed Up machine to the first row on its debut. We did an overall good job, we were fast and this is a positive result. I hope there’s a chance to improve even more, to be some tenths faster so we can be more competitive. This is going to be a tough race, especially with Tom Luthi and Marc Marquez as rivals, we need to stay calm and do our best. Thanks to the team for the awesome work they’ve done.” Moto3 Rider Quotes Maverick Vinales, Blusens Avintia, FTR Honda: 2nd – 2m, 8.188s “This session was really good for us. We will try a few different things with the engine in warm-up in order to be up there with the KTMs. The race is shaping up well for me. We have a good pace and have been working with worn tyres. A front row start can be considered a good result, because that will help me to avoid a jam on the first corner and to break away. The goal for tomorrow is to find a quick pace. As the laps go by we will see if a win is possible or not.” More, from a press release issued by Dorna Communications: An enthralling first qualifying session of the 2012 MotoGP™ season saw Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha Factory Racing) take pole position for the Commercialbank Grand Prix of Qatar, as the Spanish rider beat reigning World Champion Casey Stoner (Repsol Honda) to the fastest lap by 0.221s on Saturday evening. Lorenzo’s time of 1’54.634 gave him the edge over Stoner as the pair swapped the lead more than once in the final few minutes of the one-hour session, as the appetite was well and truly whetted for the first 1000cc race. The battle for pole was not the only thing which caught the attention as Cal Crutchlow (Monster Yamaha Tech 3) put in his best-ever MotoGP qualifying display to seal the final front-row spot with the third best lap. Crutchlow’s time of 1’55.022 left him just 0.167s short of Stoner in second, and made it two Yamaha M1 machines on the front row. Ben Spies (Yamaha Factory Racing) set the fourth-fastest time before a crash five minutes from the end of qualifying brought his session to a premature close, and Nicky Hayden (Ducati Team) was the highest placing Desmosedici in fifth. Andrea Dovizioso will start his first race for the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 team from the second row after going sixth fastest in QP. Heading up the third row will be Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda), who will be accompanied by Héctor Barberá (Pramac Racing) and rookie Stefan Bradl (LCR Honda). Karel Abraham (Cardion ab Motoracing) had a crash at the very end of the session but had already qualified in 10th place, and the Czech rider will have Álvaro Bautista (San Carlo Honda Gresini) and Valentino Rossi (Ducati Team) for company on row four. Colin Edwards (NGM Mobile Forward Racing Team) took the honour of qualifying as the fastest CRT machine in 13th, 0.831s behind Rossi, with Power Electronics Aspar duo Randy de Puniet and Aleix Espargaró getting onto the fifth row with the American. The Frenchman escaped a crash 20 minutes from the end unharmed. Moto2™ In Moto2™ Thomas Lüthi (Interwetten Paddock) continued his excellent weekend by securing pole position for the opening race of the Championship. The Swiss rider topped qualifying with a time of 2’00.187, after being fastest in all three preceding practice runs. Lüthi managed to see off the challenge of Marc Márquez (Team CatalunyaCaixa Repsol) by a margin of just 0.072s as the Spaniard took second spot in the session, with Andrea Iannone (Speed Master) completing the front row in a time of 2’00.296 as fractionally more than a tenth of a second separated the top three. Pol Espargaró (Pons 40 HP Tuenti) posted the fourth fastest time of the 45-minute session, ahead of Mike di Meglio (S/Master Speed Up) and Max Neukirchner (Kiefer Racing), all of whom will start from row two. Clocking in seventh quickest was Esteve Rabat (Pons 40 HP Tuenti), and Claudio Corti (Italtrans Racing Team) recovered from an early fall in which he appeared to have hurt a hand to qualify in eighth position. Takaaki Nakagami (Italtrans Racing Team) will accompany his team-mate on the third row. Moto3™ Sandro Cortese (Red Bull KTM Ajo) took the first ever Moto3™ pole position after posting the fastest lap at the very end of the category’s qualifying run. The German rider’s final effort of 2’08.188 was enough to seal prime position on the grid by a margin of just 0.016s ahead of Maverick Viñales (Blusens Avintia). Spanish rider Viñales whose top time from FP2 was faster than Cortese’s pole looked set to take first position on the timesheet with his time of 2’08.204 until Cortese’s late salvo, with Louis Rossi (Racing Team Germany) completing the front row following a strong session. Luis Salom (RW Racing GP) led the session towards the end but eventually had to settle for fourth position, and the Spaniard will be joined on the second row by Niklas Ajo (TT Motion Events Racing) and rookie Romano Fenati (Team Italia FMI). Starting the season-opening race from the third row will be Zulfahmi Khairuddin (Airasia-SIC-Ajo), Miguel Oliveira (Estrella Galicia 0’0) and another debutant Arthur Sissis (Red Bull KTM Ajo). Both the Moto3 and Moto2 classes later went out on track to run their warm up sessions in preparation for Sunday’s races.