Simoncelli in front in MotoGP warm up

Marco Simoncelli of the San Carlo Honda Gresini Team rose to the top of the sunny MotoGP morning warm up session with a late flying lap of 1'48.430 to just beat out Repsol Honda duo Andrea Dovizioso and Casey Stoner. The two pursuers were just 0.008s and 0.050s behind the Italian, respectively. Simoncelli will start from third position on the front row for the Gran Premio d’Italia TIM MotoGP race, while Stoner starts from pole after setting a new lap record, with Dovizioso heading up row two.

Behind the three Hondas was Texan Ben Spies (Yamaha Factory Racing), who starts second on the grid, with a time just 0.082s behind than that of Simoncelli, followed by teammate and fifth place starter Jorge Lorenzo, who posted a time of 1’48.796.

Dani Pedrosa was not far behind his rivals with a warm up time of 1’49.090, ahead of Nicky Hayden (Ducati Team), Colin Edwards (Yamaha Monster Tech 3), Valentino Rossi (Ducati Team) and Hiroshi Aoyama (San Carlo Honda Gresini) completing the top ten times.