Rossi welcomes Edwards' progress

Valentino Rossi says he is pleased that his Yamaha teammate Colin Edwards has closed on him this season, as he now feels less isolated at the front of the field

Edwards has qualified second for the Turkish Grand Prix, between Rossi and Dani Pedrosa on the front row.

Rossi said that Yamaha will not employ any team orders to keep Edwards behind.

"In the race he is an enemy," he told Gazzetta dello Sport. "There's no kind of team orders for him, he can play out his chances.

"Colin still has some little problems, but if he solves them he can fight with us.

"I like it that way: last year I was feeling isolated against four Hondas.

"It was like being at the traffic light and you honk at the guy in front, but four people step out of the car... It's a lot better now."

Rossi reckons that Ducati's Casey Stoner will be Yamaha's main challenger in today's race.

"Pedrosa will be in the middle of the battle," he said. "But, to be honest, in the one-to-one fight I see Stoner stronger.

"He's riding quick. He's fast in T4, he's fast in the big turn and he has 10 km/h more speed on the straight."

Stoner was fastest in this morning's warm-up, while Rossi was only sixth quickest.

"We tried the race tyre and the bike slides quite a bit, so it will be a tough final part of the race," he told Italia1 television.

"Let's hope most of all that Stoner was using a soft tyre because this morning he found some lap times that he never did in the other sessions."