Dani Pedrosa of Spain and Repsol Honda Team leads Alvaro Bautista of Spain and Rizla Suzuki MotoGP during the qualifying practice of MotoGP of Malaysia at Sepang Circuit on October 22, 2011 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Getty Images
Motor Sports
Pedrosa on pole for Malaysian GP
HONDA'S Dani Pedrosa has snatched pole position for the Malaysian Grand Prix ahead of newly crowned MotoGP world champion Casey Stoner.
The Spaniard clocked a fastest lap of two minutes and 1.462 seconds at Sepang to edge team-mate Stoner and claim only his second pole of 2011 for Sunday's race.
Stoner's best lap was 2:01.491, with Italian Andrea Dovizioso's 2:01.666 completing a Honda front row for the penultimate round of the season.
Pedrosa did not have things all his own way despite dominating practice, falling at the final corner just 12 minutes into qualifying.
He quickly rejoined the fray but it took him until 38 minutes into the hour to return to top spot after some jousting between Dovizioso and Marco Simoncelli's Honda.
