Stoner escapes serious injury in crash

The former world champion secured third on the grid before suffering a high-side at Turn 3. Already struggling with a prolonged illness, Stoner had to be removed from the scene on a stretcher, but quickly recovered. A groin injury was later discovered, but he is optimistic that it will not hold him back.

"It hurt when I landed but I thought I'd only winded myself," said Stoner.

"Now it looks like I might have torn something in my groin, which is not the best thing to happen before the race. Anyway, we have a great bike for this track so we'll see what we can do."

Valentino Rossi had suggested that both Stoner's accident and the crash that Jorge Lorenzo had suffered at Turn 10 just moments before were the consequence of low tyre temperatures, and Stoner concurred with this explanation.

"To be honest the bike had given us a few warnings in a lot of places around the circuit today and I'm sure there were a lot of other guys in a similar situation," he said.

"The tyre is quite hard on the right-hand side and needs a couple of laps to warm up properly. Unfortunately on the lap before the crash, in the most important corner for heating that side of the tyre up I was held up by two riders having a disagreement and then I got stuck behind one of them into the next right-hander too.

"I was wary that the tyre would be cooler than I needed it to be on the next lap so I went into Turn 3 a lot more carefully than normal, but as I closed the gas on the way into the corner the rear just came around.

"I tried to pick the bike up and go straight into the gravel but it didn't want to and that was it - it threw me straight up in the air."