Max Biaggi's sensational qualifying lap from yesterday was enough to seal pole position for tomorrow's Gauloises Czech Republic Grand Prix despite the best efforts of fellow Italians Valentino Rossi and Loris Capirossi. Rossi signalled his intentions in this morning's free practice, becoming only the second man after Biaggi to lap below 2'01 at the Brno circuit. Goorbergh surprisingly became the third as this afternoon's final qualifying practice reached an exciting climax, but he was edged out to fourth place on the grid in the dying stages by Rossi and Capirossi, who clocked the second and third fastest laps respectively.

Biaggi - "I knew my time would be hard to beat, I did my best but we had a small problem early in the session," explained Biaggi after his fourth pole of 2001. "Some oil got on to a footpeg and that made my foot slip off the 'peg, I almost crashed, it was a scary moment. That lost us ten minutes as we checked the bike over. After that I went out and put some laps on a few different tyres, so we've tried all the different options, now we just need to calculate which tyre will be the best for the race. We made a few small changes to the bike from yesterday, and I've a few other things I'd like to try in the warm-up. It's going to be a difficult race, I'll be doing everything I can to win."

Rossi - "We've been concentrating on fast qualifying laps, because it's very important to start from the front row here, I can't keep winning from the third row!" grinned the 22-year-old. "We couldn't seem to find any traction yesterday, so we changed the way we work, making a lot more changes than usual and so far it's been successful. But my only concern is that we've not really been able to work on race settings; at the moment the bike lacks grip when I ride with race set-up and race tyres. We'll work on that tonight and during morning warm-up, but anyway I'm very happy that we've been able to reduce the gap so much today."

Capirossi - "So far this season we've had problems in the late stages of races and I was thinking about that during the midseason break," explained Capirossi. "We used to do most of practice with near-full tanks, and maybe that's why the bike wouldn't work so well on an almost empty tank. I think we've fixed that problem by doing more qualifying on lower fuel loads and I think we can be strong tomorrow, though it's going to be tough in this heat."

Proton Team KR rider Jurgen Van Den Goorbergh rounds out the front row after qualifying 4th fastest - "The team has been working pretty hard over the past weeks since Germany, and the way to prove it was to get into the top eight. The German race was the lowest point all season, but we are challenging in a new direction with the Big Bang motor, and we kept trying. We still have to race, but we've made the first step. The engine is not perfect yet. It needs to be a little bit sharper, and we could have got a couple more tenths.  Qualifying went well, though. We worked on finding a race set-up, with both bikes the same for the first time, then went for a quick time in the last 20 minutes. I'm ready for the race. Even with a race tyre and plenty of fuel I was able to run 2:01s. I don't know if I can finish in the top three, but for sure I can go with any group. I can ride with anyone here. My problem is that the other bikes still have a little bit more speed, and on the hill at the end of the lap that means it is easy for them to pass me again. So at the finish I will be at the back of the group. If it is a small enough group, I could be on the rostrum. In the future, it is only going to be better. I am riding at the limit, but that has always been easy for me. We are still not at the limit of the bike yet".

McCoy will take up fifth place on the grid and will be joined on the second row by World Champion Roberts, who failed to improve on his effort from yesterday and is forced to settle for sixth.

McCoy had this to say, "I am a little disappointed not to be on the front row. At the beginning of this afternoon's session we had a problem with chatter and put it down to tyre choice, whereas in fact it was almost certainly caused by a change we made to the front suspension during this morning's session. In all we probably lost about 25 minutes sorting the problem out and I think without that I could have got in the top four. Still I have a respectable position on the grid for tomorrow's race and providing I get a good start I see no reason why I canąt finish on the podium."

Criville dropped back from a provisional fourth spot to line up in eighth behind Spanish compatriot Checa, who set his best time after falling on the second lap. Haslam was the only other 500 rider to crash today, but he will line up tomorrow in seventeenth spot behind Nakano providing the Japanese rider opts to race after suffering a broken bone in his hand on Friday.

Anthony West qualified 18th - "Yesterday was terrible – I had bike trouble in both sessions and it was a bit of a struggle. Today went okay, but at this track you really feel the lack of power (of V-Twin machines) compared to the V4s, especially on the last straight climbing up the hill. The heat makes it even worse and makes the difference even bigger. The 'Twin' is good on the corners, but on the fast straights it just gets eaten alive. We haven't done anything different to the bike. We got it right and kept it going. There's nothing more to be done – except maybe add another two cylinders."

500cc rookies Brendan Clarke and Shaun Geronomi ended the day 21st and 23rd fastest respectively. Many will be surprised that Geronomi even managed to qualify the uncompetitive Paton.

Daijiro Katoh lit the touch paper and Tetsuya Harada duly exploded to set a staggering 250 pole record in the dying stages of an otherwise dull final qualifying practice for the quarter-litre category. It took a full 55 minutes of the hour-long session before the provisional front two rows were altered, Debon leaping from fourteenth place to seventh. With just 1 minute and 25 seconds remaining Katoh leapfrogged Melandri for second place, but any thoughts the Championship leader had of pole position were immediately extinguished by Harada who launched into a fast lap to beat his previous best pole by over half a second, clocking 2'02.953.

Fonsi Nieto briefly flirted with a front row spot when he shifted up to fourth, but as Melandri just failed to improve on third with a late fast lap McWilliams pulled out the stops to squeeze ahead of his Italian Aprilia colleague and effectively relegate the Spaniard to fifth.

Toni Elias eventually emerged on top of the pile and on pole position for the 125cc race after a breathtaking final qualifying session which saw the top ten riders qualify within a second. Four men lapped under the previous best pole at the circuit, Elias coming within a whisker of the 2'09 mark at 2'09.062 to take top spot ahead of Ui, Cecchinello and Sanna. Home rider Smrz will make his first ever second row appearance tomorrow in fifth, Championship leader Poggiali has his work cut out after qualifying eleventh, with pole setter Elias lying just 3 points behind him in the current rider standings.