Valencia MotoGP: ‘Casey was on fire’, says Jorge Lorenzo

Jorge Lorenzo said he never had a chance of claiming pole position for tomorrow’s Valencia MotoGP race with Casey Stoner in such ominous form.

Stoner blitzed to his fourth pole position of the season this afternoon with a brilliant lap of 1.31.799 to easily top qualifying.

Lorenzo was a massive 0.331s adrift on his Fiat Yamaha and he said the 2007 world champion was simply untouchable.

Lorenzo, who clinched his maiden world title in Sepang last month, said: “Casey was really on fire today. He’s really fast in Phillip Island, but he’s also fast here and this is maybe one of his favourite tracks where he’s faster.   

“For me it’s the opposite. It’s one of the worst tracks for my riding, but anyway I’m in good shape. But we’ll start on the first row and we have options for the win. It’s going to be tough because Casey always has a really impressive start of the race, but we are going to try.”

Lorenzo joked that he might have been keeping something in reserve having worn a special world championship celebration helmet this afternoon.

The lid is crystal-encrusted and worth 12,000 Euros and he said: “I couldn’t improve my times because I was scared to destroy it.”