Italian to start British Grand Prix from head of MotoGP grid for first time since 2005.

Valentino Rossi took pole position number four of the 2009 season on Saturday afternoon with the fastest lap of MotoGP qualifying at Donington Park. The Fiat Yamaha rider’s time of 1’28.116 gave him his first top spot for the British Grand Prix since 2005 –the last occasion in which he won at the Midlands track.

Rossi now has twice as many pole positions as he did for the entire 2008 season and, following his pole position last week in Germany, heads the qualifying timesheet for consecutive races for the first time since the beginning of 2007. His hot lap came at the end of the session in a frantic shootout, in which he sent Dani Pedrosa –the top man in both Free Practice sessions- packing by just under a tenth of a second.

Teammate and title rival Jorge Lorenzo was also hot on the Italian’s heels, placing third on the grid and maintaining his 100% record of front row starts in the current campaign. He relegated Ducati Marlboro’s Casey Stoner –who lowsided at Macleans for his second fall of the day- to the head of the second line by just 0.044.

Andrea Dovizioso and Colin Edwards join Stoner on row two, riding for Repsol Honda and Monster Tech 3 Yamaha, respectively. Edwards’ teammate and the only home rider in the premier class, James Toseland equaled his best qualifying performance of the year with ninth in the session.

In addition to Stoner’s fall, Scot Racing rider Gabor Talmacsi also came off his bike during the run-out.