At last the sun shone at Mugello but the change in weather brought mixed fortunes for the British riders during qualifying for the Alice Grand Prix of Italy.
In the MotoGP class, James Toseland rode brilliantly to qualify eighth on his first racing visit to the 3.259 circuit but Bradley Smith crashed at the finish of the 125 cc session and broke a bone in his left foot. He suffered a fracture of the fifth metatarsal, a similar injury to England football stars Wayne Rooney and David Beckham. A decision will be made if he is fit to race after the warm-up tomorrow morning. If he does start and that seems likely, the 17 year old Polaris World riders will start from the third row after qualifying in seventh place.
Twenty seven year old Toseland had looked very impressive in the wet yesterday adjusted well to the dry conditions around the fast undulating track riding the Tech 3 Yamaha in just his sixth MotoGP qualifying session.
“The changeable conditions have made it a difficult weekend for me with rain in practice and then dry conditions in qualifying,” explained the Yorkshireman.” I was running well in the wet but then had only one hour to get used to the dry set-up before fitting qualifying tyres. I’m fortunate to have an experienced team-mate in Colin Edwards who has helped me find an interesting set-up for tomorrow. In the ideal world I would like to have secured a place on the front two rows but we have made excellent progress over the last two days and I have to be happy with that.”
After so much rain in practice the 125 qualifying session was held on a dry track and it was 21 year old Italian Rafaelle de Rossa who took his first pole position with 15 year old Scott Redding, who was so impressive in the wet yesterday 16th and Kent-based Danny Webb one place behind him
In the 250cc qualifying session Ulsterman Eugene Laverty crashed and finally qualified 20th riding the Blusens Aprilia.
Rossi Makes Hay in the Sunshine Valentino Rossi is on the crest of a wave at the moment. The 29 year old Italian leads the MotoGP World Championship after two successive grands prix wins, he chases his seventh consecutive premier class grand prix win at Mugello and to complete the picture he grabbed his first pole position of the season and his first on Bridgestone tyres, riding the Fiat Yamaha. It was his 50th pole position and his first since Barcelona almost a year ago.
However, victory tomorrow is no forgone conclusion because joining him on the front row of the grid for the 23 lap encounter will be the Repsol Honda of Dani Pedrosa and Rossi’s old sparring partner Loris Capirossi, riding the Rizla Suzuki. World Champion Casey Stoner fronts the second row on the Marlboro Ducati where he’s joined by Americans Colin Edwards and former World Champion Nicky Hayden.
It was an important one hour session in the sunshine after so much rain on Friday and Saturday morning and certainly the sun could be shining on Rossi and thousands of his fans on Sunday afternoon.
