Pedrosa takes pole

Dani Pedrosa has taken pole position for the British GP at Donington.

The Spanish rider set the fastest ever lap of the circuit, 1:27.676, to take the top spot in the qualifying session, beating the previous best lap of 1:27.897 set by Rossi last year.

Second place on the grid goes to Suzuki rider Chris Vermeulen who finished incredibly almost half a second behind the Honda rider.

Marco Melandri takes the final place on the front row just 5 hundredths of a second behind Vermeulen.

John Hopkins heads the second row in front of Loris Capirossi and Randy de Puniet.

Valentino Rossi struggled with his injuries despite custom made glove from Dainese and extra thick padding on his bars designed to relieve the strain on his wrist. He will start his ‘second home race’ from 12th.

Official times:

Dani PEDROSA

Chris VERMEULEN 0.482

Marco MELANDRI 0.529

John HOPKINS 0.576

Loris CAPIROSSI 0.718

Randy DE PUNIET 0.752

Shinya NAKANO 0.755

Casey STONER 0.771

Kenny ROBERTS JR 0.797

Colin EDWARDS 0.805

Nicky HAYDEN 0.833

Valentino ROSSI 1.132

Carlos CHECA 1.618

Makoto TAMADA 1.686

Alex HOFMANN 1.803

James ELLISON 2.706

Ivan SILVA 4.162

Jose Luis CARDOSO 4.576