Repsol Honda's Casey Stoner had taken pole position for tomorrow's Estoril MotoGP race with team-mate Dani Pedrosa beside him but it is another front-row start for Britain's Cal Crutchlow who held top spot in the interrupted session with only a couple of minutes left to run.
Stoner went round in 1'37.188 to depose Pedrosa by just 0.013s and the pair are only a tenth faster than Monster Yamaha's Crutchlow who ended as top Yamaha runner an in front of Jorge Lorenzo who aborted his final flying lap and rolled across the line in fourth, two-tenths slower than his satellite-mounted counterpart.
Ben Spies put the second works Yamaha in fifth after being ahead on the clock through the first two sectors but losing a massive eight-tenths in the final run to the line. Alvaro Bautista occupies his customary sixth place ahead of Andrea Dovizioso (thanks to Big Jack Valentine for pointing out the error here we have just erased) on the second Monster Yamaha.
Hector Barbera was the first Ducati home in eighth and he has Valentino Rossi and Nicky Hayden, both on factory GP12s behind him. The Doctor climbed up to seventh at the end of the session but then slid back. He is only eight-tenths off the pace using a new setup this weekend.
The session was stopped after Randy De Puniet lost the front of his Aspar CRT bike on the left-hander running on to the back straight. His errant ART machine collected an entirely-innocent Colin Edwards who has a suspected broken collarbone as a result. De Puniet has a left-shoulder contusion. James Ellison got himself up to 19th and is four seconds off the pace.
