Motegi wash-out gives Rossi pole

A torrential downpour shortly after the MotoGP practice on Saturday caused the 125cc and MotoGP qualifying session to be delayed, and the decision to cancel the day's running was taken when the rained did not let up for the rest of the afternoon in Japan.

The grid was decided on the fastest times set by each rider during the weekend's practice sessions, all of which were set on Friday as Saturday's practice session was run in wet conditions.

Rossi earned his 42nd premier class pole position with his last flying lap of Friday's session when he beat Ducati's Casey Stoner's best effort by just 0.056s. Stoner will join Rossi's works Yamaha on the front row, along with the second factory Yamaha of Jorge Lorenzo.

Suzuki and Kawasaki were among those to benefit from the Friday times being counted, with Chris Vermeulen and Loris Capirossi sandwiching Colin Edwards - who was fastest in today's wet practice session - on the second row. Marco Melandri's Hayate Kawasaki was eigth quickest on Friday, so will start in the middle of the third row.

Andrea Dovizioso's late effort on a poor Friday for Honda became more significant as it earned him seventh on the grid, while team-mate Dani Pedrosa will start down in 11th place.

Toni Elias will start ninth on his Gresini Honda, with James Toseland's Tech 3 Yamaha completing the top 10.

Pos Rider                  Team                Time          Gap
 1. Valentino Rossi        Yamaha              1m48.545s
 2. Casey Stoner           Ducati              1m48.601s  +0.056
 3. Jorge Lorenzo          Yamaha              1m48.965s  +0.420
 4. Chris Vermeulen        Suzuki              1m49.382s  +0.837
 5. Colin Edwards          Tech 3 Yamaha       1m49.697s  +1.152
 6. Loris Capirossi        Suzuki              1m49.980s  +1.435
 7. Andrea Dovizioso       Honda               1m50.030s  +1.485
 8. Marco Melandri         Hayate Kawasaki     1m50.123s  +1.578
 9. Toni Elias             Gresini Honda       1m50.209s  +1.664
10. James Toseland         Tech 3 Yamaha       1m50.342s  +1.797
11. Dani Pedrosa           Honda               1m50.391s  +1.846
12. Nicky Hayden           Ducati              1m50.393s  +1.848
13. Yuki Takahashi         Scot Honda          1m50.404s  +1.859
14. Sete Gibernau          Hernando Ducati     1m50.538s  +1.993
15. Alex de Angelis        Gresini Honda       1m50.601s  +2.056
16. Randy de Puniet        LCR Honda           1m50.669s  +2.124
17. Mika Kallio            Pramac Ducati       1m51.643s  +3.098
18. Niccolo Canepa         Pramac Ducati       1m51.929s  +3.384