Fiat Yamaha's Jorge Lorenzo has set pole position for tomorrow's Laguna Seca MotoGP race but his participation could be in doubt after suffering a massive, last-lap highside at the bottom of The Corkscrew.
The Spaniard had gone out for a final set of flying laps and a cold tyre caight him out as he exited the bottom of the infamous left/right flick. He was pitched clear across the track and landed heavily on his shoulder. It was Lorenzo's second crash of the session after he lobbed it at turn four with 22 minutes of the session to go
At almost exactly the same time as Lorenzo pinged it for the second time, the still-ill Casey Stoner also fell foul of a highside, crashing as he got onto the gas in the middle of turn three, scene of the famous Marco Melandri/Kurtis Roberts interface.
Lorenzo's team-mate Valentino Rossi was second quickest, a little less than two-tenths of a second in arrears with Stoner rounding out the front row, fractionally slower than The Doctor.
It's an all-Honda third row with Dani Pedrosa, Andrea Dovizioso and Toni Elias getting into a scrap for fourth with five minutes to go, while home riders Colin Edwards and Nicky Hayden occupy the first two places on row three, joined by Chris Vermeulen, just a second off the pace.
Britain's James Toseland is in 15th place, a poor result for the Monster Yamaha man given his World Superbike experience at the California circuit.
