Press release:Smith knocks rivals out of the park for Donington home pole
Bradley Smith will start his home Grand Prix at Donington Park with the best view in the house on Sunday morning, sitting on pole position for the second time this season. The Bancaja Aspar rider had to pull something special out of his box of tricks in the final minute of the qualifying session, duly obliging with a 1’37.442 lap to grab the top spot from Marc Marquez.
Smith has never had the best of results at the venue for the British Grand Prix, but his final chance to take glory at the Midlands circuit is his best shot at a memorable victory.
Red Bull KTM rider Marquez separates Smith and World Championship leader Julián Simon on the grid, with third Aspar rider Sergio Gadea putting the entire squadron on the front line for only the second time this year. Simón had crashed early on in the session.
2008 race winner Scott Redding had problems in the session and will take off from eleventh, whilst Danny Webb will rev up his De Graaf Grand Prix Aprilia from fourteenth.
All four of the British wildcards –James Lodge, Martin Glossop, Timothy Hastings and Paul Jordan- qualified for the race.
James Toseland will start the MotoGP race from ninth, his joint best qualifying placing of 2009.
Rossi takes pole for Donington finale
Valentino Rossi took pole position number four of the 2009 season on Saturday afternoon with the fastest lap of MotoGP qualifying at Donington Park. The Fiat Yamaha rider’s time of 1’28.116 gave him his first top spot for the British Grand Prix since 2005 –the last occasion in which he won at the Midlands track.
Rossi now has twice as many pole positions as he did for the entire 2008 season and, following his pole position last week in Germany, heads the qualifying timesheet for consecutive races for the first time since the beginning of 2007. His hot lap came at the end of the session in a frantic shootout, in which he sent Dani Pedrosa –the top man in both Free Practice sessions- packing by just under a tenth of a second.
Teammate and title rival Jorge Lorenzo was also hot on the Italian’s heels, placing third on the grid and maintaining his 100% record of front row starts in the current campaign. He relegated Ducati Marlboro’s Casey Stoner –who low sided at Macleans for his second fall of the day- to the head of the second line by just 0.044.
Andrea Dovizioso and Colin Edwards join Stoner on row two, riding for Repsol Honda and Monster Tech 3 Yamaha, respectively. Edwards’ teammate and the only home rider in the premier class, James Toseland equalled his best qualifying performance of the year with ninth in the session.
In addition to Stoner’s fall, Scot Racing rider Gabor Talmacsi also came off his bike during the run-out.
