Jorge Lorenzo led for most of the session until a red flag incident between Colin Edwards and Randy De Puniet forced a restart with nine minutes remaining. A mixture of heavy traffic along with a lack of confidence in certain corners resulted in a gradual drop to a grid position of fourth on the second row, just 0.278 seconds from pole. This will be the first time since 2008 that Lorenzo has not started from the front row of the grid at Estoril.

Having finally got his 2012 season firmly back on track with a highly competitive pace, Ben Spies endured an extremely frustrating qualifying session with at least three hot laps interrupted by slower traffic. Having been denied a front row lap time Spies will start tomorrow’s race from fifth on the grid alongside his team mate on the second row.  

Jorge Lorenzo Position: 4th Time: 1'37.466 Laps: 29
“The main problem for me today was that in turn one and two I couldn’t enter aggressively so I lost a lot of time in this section. In general the bike is not giving me a good feeling so this lap time was the maximum I could get today. We are in fourth but tomorrow is going to be hard as I have to try to pass Cal who is a hard braker! I will keep thinking positive and see what we can do.” 

It was a tough session for everybody, the annoying thing was that three of my best laps were blocked but that’s just the way it goes

Ben Spies Position: 5th Time: 1'37.723 Laps: 26
“It was a tough session for everybody, the annoying thing was that three of my best laps were blocked but that’s just the way it goes. Two of them I think could have been avoided but one of them was just a racing incident. We’re on the second row in the middle and we’re a lot better than we were in Jerez. I feel good on the bike and I just need to keep building the confidence now. Being three tenths behind Jorge at this track is pretty good.” 

Wilco Zeelenberg Team Manager
“It was a tough qualifying, we were on pole up until nine minutes to go so I think fourth looks worse than we actually are. 0.2 of a second is not a lot. We are still struggling on rear grip in corner entry; especially the first two splits so we need to improve the bike. If we can do that we have a good chance to battle at the front tomorrow.” 

Qualifying Times

Front Row
1. Casey Stoner (AUS) Repsol Honda Team 1'37.188
2. Dani Pedrosa (SPA) Repsol Honda Team 1'37.201
3. Cal Crutchlow (GBR) Yamaha Tech3 1'37.289

Second Row
4. Jorge Lorenzo (SPA) Yamaha Factory Racing 1'37.466
5. Ben Spies (USA) Yamaha Factory Racing 1'37.723
6. Alvaro Bautista (SPA) Honda Gresini 1'37.917

Third Row
7. Andrea Dovizioso (ITA) Yamaha Tech3 1'37.943
8. Hector Barbera (SPA) Pramac Racing Team 1'38.006
9. Valentino Rossi (ITA) Ducati Team 1'38.059

Fourth Row
10. Nicky Hayden (USA) Ducati Team 1'38.253
11. Stefan Bradl (GER) LCR Honda 1'38.265
12. Aleix Espargaro (SPA) Power Electronics Aspar 1'39.353

Fifth Row
13. Karel Abraham (CZE) Cardion AB Motoracing 1'39.398
14. Randy De Puniet (FRA) Power Electronics Aspar 1'39.586
15. Yonny Hernandez (COL) Avintia Racing 1'40.029

Sixth Row
16. Michele Pirro (ITA) San Carlo Honda Gresini 1'40.225 17. Mattia Pasini (ITA) Speed Master 1'40.387 18. Colin Edwards (USA) NGM Mobile Forward Racing 1'40.964

Seventh Row
19. James Ellison (UK) Paul Bird Motorsport 1'41.394
20. Danilo Petrucci (ITA) Came Iodaracing Project 1'41.486
21. Ivan Silva (SPA) Avintia Racing 1'41.490

Estoril Record Lap D.Pedrosa (Honda) 2009,1'36.937
Estoril Best Lap J.Lorenzo (Yamaha) 2008,1'35.715