Pedrosa sets Mugello warm-up pace

Dani Pedrosa unleashed the sort of form in this morning's warm-up that netted him pole position for round four of MotoGP at Mugello yesterday.

Honda's Pedrosa achieved a one-off 1m49.750s lap to top the session by over three-tenths of a second from series leader Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) and Ducati's Casey Stoner.

Pedrosa's second-best lap was a 1m50.246, and didn't show the regularity of laptimes displayed by Lorenzo, who rattled off a sequence of low 50s. His best was a 1m50.056s.

The biggest surprise was Stoner's consistency. Despite a huge wobble at the corner which claimed Valentino Rossi in practice yesterday, and his claims that Ducati has yet to turn a corner with its rideability, he reeled off an impressive sequence of laps to suggest a podium finish is achievable today.

Stoner's best lap was 1m50.126s, just 0.07s slower than Lorenzo.

Andrea Dovizioso was fourth fastest on the second Honda, ahead of Loris Capirossi for the struggling Suzuki squad, and Tech 3 Yamaha's Colin Edwards.

Pos Rider                Team          Time          Gap
 1. Dani Pedrosa         Honda         1m49.750s
 2. Jorge Lorenzo        Yamaha        1m50.056s  +0.306
 3. Casey Stoner         Ducati        1m50.126s  +0.376
 4. Andrea Dovizioso     Honda         1m50.273s  +0.523
 5. Loris Capirossi      Suzuki        1m50.312s  +0.562
 6. Colin Edwards        Yamaha        1m50.348s  +0.598
 7. Randy de Puniet      Honda         1m50.380s  +0.630
 8. Ben Spies            Yamaha        1m50.453s  +0.703
 9. Nicky Hayden         Ducati        1m50.461s  +0.711
10. Hiroshi Aoyama       Honda         1m50.585s  +0.835
11. Aleix Espargaro      Ducati        1m50.700s  +0.950
12. Marco Melandri       Honda         1m50.734s  +0.984
13. Marco Simoncelli     Honda         1m50.985s  +1.235
14. Mika Kallio          Ducati        1m52.197s  +2.447
15. Alvaro Bautista      Suzuki        1m52.469s  +2.719
16. Hector Barbera       Ducati        1m52.549s  +2.799