Casey Stoner takes pole despite qualifying crash

Casey Stoner has secured pole position for Sunday’s Air Asia Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix despite crashing his Repsol Honda midway through the hour long qualifying session.

Stoner was flung from his bike when its rear-wheel broke traction heading into the Turn 4 hairpin just 20 minutes into the session, forcing the Australian to limp back to the pits for his spare bike.

The 27-year-old then managed to undercut his previous benchmark on just his second lap on the new machine, going on to cement the pole by lapping faster still on two later runs, ending with a best of 1:29.62s.

Jorge Lorenzo was 0.5s adrift in second, while fellow Spaniard and championship rival Dani Pedrosa completes the front-row.

All riders were denied the chance to go quicker in the final two minutes when threatening skies finally delivered a brief rain shower.

Cal Crutchlow, Stefan Bradl and Andrea Dovizioso will make up the second row for the race, with Alvaro Bautista, Valentino Rossi, Randy de Puniet and Nicky Hayden rounding out the top 10.

There was disappointment for Australian substitute rider Kris McLaren, who failed to make the qualifying cut-off on the Avintia Blusens BQR.

McLaren’s session had been interrupted by a high-side exiting MG Corner moments before Stoner endured his off.

Another to head off-track during the session was de Puniet, who toured the gravel at the Southern Loop before rejoining unharmed.

A 20 minute morning warm-up will complete pre-race festivities for the MotoGP field tomorrow morning before the 27 lap Air Asia Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix, which is set to start at 1600.

See below for the full qualifying result

Pos.	Num.	Rider	Nation	Team	Bike	Km/h	Time	Gap 1st/Prev.
1	1	Casey STONER	AUS	Repsol Honda Team	Honda	335.6	1’29.623
2	99	Jorge LORENZO	SPA	Yamaha Factory Racing	Yamaha	330.6	1’30.140	0.517 / 0.517
3	26	Dani PEDROSA	SPA	Repsol Honda Team	Honda	335.7	1’30.575	0.952 / 0.435
4	35	Cal CRUTCHLOW	GBR	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	Yamaha	332.7	1’30.763	1.140 / 0.188
5	6	Stefan BRADL	GER	LCR Honda MotoGP	Honda	337.1	1’30.798	1.175 / 0.035
6	4	Andrea DOVIZIOSO	ITA	Monster Yamaha Tech 3	Yamaha	334.7	1’31.200	1.577 / 0.402
7	19	Alvaro BAUTISTA	SPA	San Carlo Honda Gresini	Honda	334.9	1’31.490	1.867 / 0.290
8	46	Valentino ROSSI	ITA	Ducati Team	Ducati	337.4	1’31.661	2.038 / 0.171
9	14	Randy DE PUNIET	FRA	Power Electronics Aspar	ART	323.6	1’31.667	2.044 / 0.006
10	69	Nicky HAYDEN	USA	Ducati Team	Ducati	334.4	1’31.681	2.058 / 0.014
11	17	Karel ABRAHAM	CZE	Cardion AB Motoracing	Ducati	339.6	1’31.910	2.287 / 0.229
12	41	Aleix ESPARGARO	SPA	Power Electronics Aspar	ART	319.8	1’31.990	2.367 / 0.080
13	8	Hector BARBERA	SPA	Pramac Racing Team	Ducati	334.1	1’32.231	2.608 / 0.241
14	51	Michele PIRRO	ITA	San Carlo Honda Gresini	FTR	316.8	1’33.050	3.427 / 0.819
15	9	Danilo PETRUCCI	ITA	Came IodaRacing Project	Ioda-Suter	315.4	1’33.069	3.446 / 0.019
16	5	Colin EDWARDS	USA	NGM Mobile Forward Racing	Suter	321.7	1’33.450	3.827 / 0.381
17	77	James ELLISON	GBR	Paul Bird Motorsport	ART	317.4	1’33.489	3.866 / 0.039
18	84	Roberto ROLFO	ITA	Speed Master	ART	314.0	1’33.577	3.954 / 0.088
19	22	Ivan SILVA	SPA	Avintia Blusens	BQR	313.5	1’34.156	4.533 / 0.579
	43	Kris McLAREN	AUS	Avintia Blusens	BQR	311.6	1’36.324	6.701 / 2.168