Repsol Honda's Dani Pedrosa nicked pole position for tomorrow's Mugello MotoGP round from under the nose of reigning champion Jorge Lorenzo by 0.069s with a new fastest ever lap of 1'47.157 with his final circuit at the Italian track.
Lorenzo had been fast out of the blocks, setting a 1'47.621 with his opener which he then dropped to a 1'47.593 while Pedrosa languished in seventh place and getting involved in some handbags with Andrea Dovizioso but he collected himself and topped the sheets with his last effort.
Ducati's Dovizioso himself banged in a fast final lap to steal the final front-row spot from Britain's Cal Crutchlow, who had got up from an early crash to set a 1'47.632 only for Dovizioso to go 0.004s faster.
LCR Honda's Stefan Bradl finished in fifth ahead of the injured Marc Marquez, who was second early on but slid back to sixth place. Valentino Rossi's Friday worries came true as he could only muster seventh place, one ahead of Nicky Hayden, who is a little less than nine-tenths off Pedrosa's pace.
Alvaro Bautista and Michele Pirro rounded out the top ten with Bradley Smith bagging 11th place despite having a mashed little finger and a cracked scaphoid. Aleix Espargaro rounds out the top 12.
