MotoGP: Qualifying from the Catalan GP

MotoGP comes to us this weekend from Catalunya country, just outside of Barcelona, Spain for the Catalan GP. One of the centers of GP racing, local favorite Dani Pedrosa decided to sit out his home GP, and instead try and recover from his broken collarbone, which he broke two weeks ago at the French GP. The man many blame for Pedrosa’s injuries, Marco Simoncelli, was also under close scrutinty, as the Italian had to go to the principal’s office in the form of a chat with MotoGP Race Direction.

With the weather constantly variable throughout the week, yesterday’s sessions saw a mix of rain and sunshine, which caught-out Monster Yamaha Tech 3 ride Colin Edwards. The American crashed on cold slick tires on the semi-damp track, also breaking his collarbone. His participation in the Catalan GP is out, and question marks hang over his return by the time of the British GP. With qualifying action underway, we saw a few surprises in the results. Read on after the jump.

Taking over on the time sheet in the closing minutes, Marco Simoncelli bested fellow Honda rider Casey Stoner for the top honor. Setting the pole pace on his penultimate lap, Simoncelli took one more stab at raising the qualifying bar, and was on pace for a faster lap until Turn 12, where Super Sic had a moment, and ended up saving the bike by putting it up on his knee. If tomorrow’s race is half as good as the qualifying, we should be in for a treat.

“It went well and I am much happier now than I have been for the past two weeks leading up to the Grand Prix. I was strong even though we had a few problems at the start of the session when I couldn’t push as hard as I would have liked,” said pole-setter Marco Simoncelli. “By the end we had solved the problems and I was able to ride really fast, although I never thought I would be able to set pole because Casey had been so fast in every session.”

“I took a bit of a risk on the last lap trying to go faster and managed to save it, so finally my long legs have been good for something! Tomorrow won’t be easy because both Casey and Jorge have a fast race pace but I will try to stay with them. My first target is to finish the race, the second is to finish on the podium and you can guess the third!”

Qualifying Results from the Catalan GP at Barcelona, Spain:

Pos.	No.	Rider	Nation	Team	Time	Diff.
1	58	Marco SIMONCELLI	ITA	San Carlo Honda Gresini	1’42.413	–
2	27	Casey STONER	AUS	Repsol Honda Team	1’42.429	0.016
3	1	Jorge LORENZO	SPA	Yamaha Factory Racing	1’42.728	0.315
4	11	Ben SPIES	USA	Yamaha Factory Racing	1’42.742	0.329
5	4	Andrea DOVIZIOSO	ITA	Repsol Honda Team	1’42.749	0.336
6	35	Cal CRUTCHLOW	GBR	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	1’43.202	0.789
7	46	Valentino ROSSI	ITA	Ducati Team	1’43.223	0.810
8	69	Nicky HAYDEN	USA	Ducati Team	1’43.228	0.815
9	19	Alvaro BAUTISTA	SPA	Rizla Suzuki MotoGP	1’43.447	1.034
10	8	Hector BARBERA	SPA	Mapfre Aspar Team MotoGP	1’43.656	1.243
11	7	Hiroshi AOYAMA	JPN	San Carlo Honda Gresini	1’43.734	1.321
12	14	Randy DE PUNIET	FRA	Pramac Racing Team	1’43.764	1.351
13	65	Loris CAPIROSSI	ITA	Pramac Racing Team	1’44.068	1.655
14	24	Toni ELIAS	SPA	LCR Honda MotoGP	1’44.510	2.097
15	17	Karel ABRAHAM	CZE	Cardion AB Motoracing	1’45.661	3.248
OUT	5	Colin EDWARDS	USA	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	–	–