Rossi `so happy´ with Donington front row

Ahead of his 200th Grand Prix, Valentino Rossi made almost the perfect preparations. Second on the grid left the Italian delighted, whilst his Fiat Yamaha teammate Jorge Lorenzo made it clear that difficulties in the Michelin-shod side of the garage were down to him.

Valentino Rossi - Second

` I´m so happy with this qualifying result and it´s very important for us that we´re on the front row tomorrow. We know that our Bridgestone tyres are very fast in the wet but this morning we had some problems with the setting and honestly I was quite concerned! Anyway, we made some important changes to the set-up for the afternoon and straight away the balance was better and I was able to open the throttle when I wanted to, in fact I had a lot of fun! With more small modifications throughout qualifying things got even better and lap-by-lap we were able to get faster, especially at the end. Now we are waiting for the weather in order to decide the tyres. If it´s dry we have quite a big question mark about some things but we have some good ideas and I am not too worried. It´s my 200th race and it's very exciting for me to reach another landmark in my career but for now I think about it as just another race.´

Jorge Lorenzo - Fifth

`This morning I was riding quite well but in the afternoon the track changed; it dried out a bit and it became more difficult for me. I improved by three seconds but it wasn´t enough because the others improved by six or seven seconds! I´ve never started so far back in MotoGP and it´s a very different experience for me. I would have liked to have done one more session in the dry conditions but it hasn´t been possible, and now I must be very focused tomorrow. For me it will be a success to finish the race, because for sure it´s better to finish than to crash! We have to keep going step-by-step and then I know that we can improve in Assen. Yesterday we made a mistake because we wanted to change a lot of things on the bike but in fact the problem was me; this is a bad time for me but I can´t let it get me down because I know this will pass and that sooner or later things will be better.´