Lorenzo Flies to Indianapolis Front Row

Championship leader Jorge Lorenzo gave it everything this afternoon in an incident packed qualifying session to take second on the grid for tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Indianapolis. Having struggled to find pace all weekend the team made a big step for qualifying, dramatically improving his speed and resulting in a qualifying time just 0.1 seconds from pole.

Team mate Ben Spies continued to show the impressive pace he’s displayed all weekend for qualifying. The Texan looked on target for a record breaking pole lap nearly half a second clear until a big high side between T13 and T14. The difficult track conditions at that corner also claimed Casey Stoner and Nicky Hayden with serious crashes. Spies was able to rejoin for the last eight minutes of qualifying but was unable to improve on his time so will start from fourth on the grid tomorrow with a time 0.4 seconds from pole.

Jorge Lorenzo: Position 2nd – Time 1.38.913 – Laps 29
“A really tough weekend so far, I really thought I wouldn’t be able to deliver but finally we modified the bike a lot with some weight on the rear to enter the corners with more confidence. I felt great as a result, could lean a lot and open the throttle quickly so I got second and was close to Dani. We don’t have a bad pace but not as good as Dani yet, we need to improve a little in the morning.”

Source: yamaha-racing.com