Espargaro again top CRT qualifier with 10th and closing in on first CRT title

The MotoGP World Championship may be decided for 2012 but for Dani Pedrosa, Jorge Lorenzo and Casey Stoner there is still plenty at stake as they look to end the season on the top step of the podium. The Australian is desperate to win his last ever MotoGP race whilst the two Spaniards are vying for home glory, Lorenzo in particular keen to show just why he is World Champion. Pedrosa, Lorenzo and Stoner were unsurprisingly the three riders who battled for pole today, finishing in that order in a front three that will seemingly take a miracle to break up tomorrow.

There is plenty of interest further down the field, however, not least in the battle for the first CRT ‘title’ in MotoGP history. Whatever happens it will be a POWER ELECTRONICS Aspar rider who takes the honour, Aleix Espargaró now in prime position to do so after out-qualifying his team-mate Randy De Puniet, whom he leads by eleven points. The Spaniard is tenth on the grid, the Frenchman twelfth, in what promises to be another exciting battle between the pair tomorrow.

10th Aleix Espargaró 1.32.834 (25 laps): “I am really happy today, that was a great session. We had next year’s bike available so I wanted to try it. With this being the first session in the dry we had a lot of work to do with it, more than I thought, so halfway through the session I switched back to my normal bike. It was the right decision and I was able to set some fast times on my last run. We are the fastest CRT and hope to be so again tomorrow after such a fun and entertaining season. I have managed to be faster than my team-mate in the last four races but tomorrow is what counts so I will try to do the best I can.”

Source: Aspar Team Press Release