MotoGP:Phillip Island (Part One) - The Colour of the Flag Is Black...

Well, this one proved to be a bumper event with action all the way around the circuit and controversies galore as riders were forced to adopt a split race mentality as the harder rear tires were deemed too heat retentive to last the full 19 laps. This meant that a mandatory pit stop would be required where riders had to change bikes for the softer compound but all after around ten laps maximum.

Riders would be disqualified, they would be chastised and others would think it was their lucky day and it's MY job to sort it all out for you and give you my take on it all, so here goes...


QUALIFYING

I'll start where any good reviewer starts, from the very beginning and it was announced that unfortunately, due to nature of the crash he suffered last time out at Sepang, German rider Stefan Bradl was forced to watch this one from the pit wall. He seemed fairly upbeat about it all despite losing out to other riders in the standings, but apparently he's due back in Motegi in the next round.

The good news though is that Nicky Hayden finally has a team to ride with next year and, as one person swapped his team for another one, a deal was eventually thrashed out that would see Hayden riding a production racer Honda!

Finally, I thought it'd never get sorted for him...

The combined times of free-practice sprung up a few surprises that qualified automatically for Q2, namely the likes of Colin Edwards, Brad Smith nailing an amazing 6th place and eking out an advantage over his team-mate Aleix Espargaro; Randy De Puniet!

Q1 - Michael Laverty was the first guy to set a time and it would get beaten by first Claudio Cortesi then Aleix Espargaro before Andrea Dovizioso managed to clock a time of sufficient speed despite being held up by Yonny Hernandez. The controversy surrounding Hernandez's position on track was not helped a little later on when he tangled with Espargaro and ultimately cost him a place in Q2 in my mind, but more on that later.

Andrea Iannone continued his resurgent form by clocking the second fastest time of the session and ultimately would bump Espargaro out of qualifying altogether. But not before Hernandez was a key, key factor in all of this...

In my mind, Espargaro had the pace to get himself top, but due to the positioning of Hernandez's machine and the fact that he was on a down lap (or not going race pace), he effectively held up Espargaro at a place on the track where there was no way for the Spaniard to pass quickly and efficiently. This cost him the time and resulted in an angry Espargaro gesturing and even kicking out at him as he passed to clock a time outside of the top two!

Q2 - Q2 meanwhile, saw the big guns come out and we found out that earlier that morning, World Champion elect Marc Marquez had crashed quite heavily, so was shaken up but would still be taking part in practice. Before the most remarkable thing happened; Jorge Lorenzo actually managed to collide with a seagull that was briefly taking up residence on the track. Basically, the bird took flight and WHAM! collided with Lorenzo's front fork no doubt severing the back of said creature killing it instantly! :O

Did this stop him? No!

Why? For one he knew nothing about it and then two, neither did his team as all the messages on his pit board were relating to the quality of the times he was setting and urging him on for doing such a great job!

My, my, my...

Unfortunately, the same kind of fortune would ultimate not be the case for Randy De Puniet who, despite automatically making it through to Q2, he was unable to set a time after coming off quite heavily resulting in no time being set by him at all.

As if the unfortunate incident with the bird (and all avian-related jokes aside, bro's!) was not enough, this did nothing at all to halt, to hinder Lorenzo's pace as he went even faster with his passenger still affixed to the bike the very next lap!

Next to set a blistering lap was Marquez, who eclipsed Casey Stoner's 2008 qualifying time of 1:28.665 by .3 of a second, going round in 1:28.3 before the luck also ran out for Colin Edwards who, just like De Puniet, made it directly through to Q2... what a schnitzer!

So with all this being proof that MotoGP was the place to be, an all Spanish front row was becoming a familiar site as Pedrosa made up that third spot, with the perennial crowd favourite (and mine too!), Valentino Rossi next in fourth, his most hated position (as he seems so good at it that he gets that more than a podium!) before the first of the Tech III Yamaha Machines ridden by Cal Crutchlow was next.

To give you bro's an idea of just how effective the tow is from one bike back to the next, Marquez was on a blistering lap, ready to eclipse his lap by even more time and at this point, the specialist towee, Alvaro Bautista managed to get a dramatic tow from Marquez that briefly put him on the front row of the grid, before the order began to settle down and Rossi nabbed it from him!

As predicted by Charlie Cox and Steve Parrish, the 1:27's were soon breached as reigning World Champion Jorge Lorenzo clocked in faster than Marquez by half a second; 1:27.8 compared to 1:28.3... awesome stuff! :D

So, that was done in the final minute and no other rider could close out that time, meaning Lorenzo scores his first pole position since round three in "". Crutchlow, meanwhile, got fith position with Pedrosa slipping down the order to sixth, before the final seconds proved another switch in positions as he jumped ahead of Crutchlow to gain 5th position.

Onto the race after the jump===>>