Rossi tops Friday practice at Sepang

At the start of the event that should see his Yamaha team-mate Lorenzo depose him as MotoGP champion, Rossi's late 2m02.724s beat Dovizioso by 0.109 seconds.

Representing the Honda works team alone with Dani Pedrosa still recovering from his Motegi injuries, Dovizioso again showed resurgent form to lead much of the session before Rossi moved ahead.

Lorenzo was third, and only needs a ninth place finish in Sunday's race to claim his first title. He also led the way for a spell in the middle of the hour.

Casey Stoner, chasing a third straight victory for Ducati this weekend, was quickest initially but then lost the front end going into Turn 4 just 12 minutes into the session. He rejoined but could not improve on his early time until the closing minutes, and still remained fourth.

A superb late lap from Alvaro Bautista brought Suzuki's rookie up to fifth, followed by Tech 3 Yamaha's Colin Edwards and Gresini Honda's Marco Melandri - who had a late near-miss with Edwards' team-mate Ben Spies. The latter was ninth quickest, between the impressive Aleix Espargaro (Pramac Ducati) and Randy de Puniet (LCR Honda).

Nicky Hayden struggled again on the second Ducati and was back in 15th, albeit just 1.2s off the pace.

Pos  Driver            Team               Time       Gap
 1.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha             2m02.724s
 2.  Andrea Dovizioso  Honda              2m02.833s  + 0.109s
 3.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha             2m02.898s  + 0.174s
 4.  Casey Stoner      Ducati             2m03.160s  + 0.436s
 5.  Alvaro Bautista   Suzuki             2m03.338s  + 0.614s
 6.  Colin Edwards     Tech 3 Yamaha      2m03.393s  + 0.669s
 7.  Marco Melandri    Gresini Honda      2m03.438s  + 0.714s
 8.  Aleix Espargaro   Pramac Ducati      2m03.471s  + 0.747s
 9.  Ben Spies         Tech 3 Yamaha      2m03.477s  + 0.753s
10.  Randy de Puniet   LCR Honda          2m03.539s  + 0.815s
11.  Marco Simoncelli  Gresini Honda      2m03.680s  + 0.956s
12.  Loris Capirossi   Suzuki             2m03.717s  + 0.993s
13.  Hector Barbera    Aspar Ducati       2m03.760s  + 1.036s
14.  Hiroshi Aoyama    Interwetten Honda  2m03.769s  + 1.045s
15.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati             2m03.947s  + 1.223s
16.  Mika Kallio       Pramac Ducati      2m04.023s  + 1.299s