The session was a thriller, with no less than seven changes of pole position during the hour, and such was the intensity of competition that Biaggi went quickest with seven minutes to go, only to slip nine places down the order over the remaining few minutes.

"The track was very busy and most of it came down to who got a clear lap," explained Marlboro Yamaha Team manager Geoff Crust. "There was only 0.89 seconds separating the top 13 guys at the end, so all it took to lose a bunch of places was to get blocked by someone through one turn. Carlos had a lot of problems with slower traffic but he kept at it and made it on to the second row. His times are consistent too, so he should be able to fight up front tomorrow. Max has been struggling to find a balance that works over all the bumps. It's so bumpy here and if you get knocked off your line through one or two turns, that's the lap effectively gone. Turn one is the worst - it looks horrific, it's so bumpy that the riders are doing well just to keep their feet on the 'pegs."

Checa, 7th - "I feel comfortable on the bike here, we've got it working well over the bumps," said the Spaniard, who had been sixth in yesterday's opening qualifying session. "I did my best lap at the end with race tyres, so that makes me confident that I can run a good pace over race distance. The problem today was that there weren't any blue flags shown to tell the slower riders to move out of the way. I got held up by several different guys and I didn't see one blue flag."

Recently crowned 500 World Champion Valentino Rossi (Nastro Azzurro Honda NSR500) ended the day a surprise fifth quickest, giving the Italian his first start off the front row since July's German GP. Rossi has only qualified off the front row four times this season.

"I was fastest yesterday and everything was looking okay," said the youngster. "We improved the bike this morning and wanted to make it even better for the bumps this afternoon but we went the wrong way with some settings. That's racing, you have to try things and they don't always work, but it's not a real concern because we can go back to our previous set-up for tomorrow and do some fine-tuning in the morning warm-up."

Max Biaggi was looking good to repeat his pole position from last year's Rio GP until his final qualifying run went awry. The Marlboro Yamaha Team man had shown his potential by slotting in the fastest time on race tyres, but when he fitted a soft rear for his last outing, he ran into chatter problems. Biaggi has had more success than anyone in qualifying this year - he's scored seven pole positions and hasn't been off the front row since May's French GP. This will be his first start of the season off the first two rows.

"When I went to pole I was running race tyres, so that made us quite confident," said the Italian. "But the soft tyre we fitted for my final run gave us some chatter, so there was no way I could push any harder. We've got a few different ideas to try during tomorrow morning's warm-up session, and if they work well, and if I get a good start, then I hope to be able to fight in the leading pack."

At one stage of the session Proton Team KR rider Jurgen van den Goorbergh was fastest, and by the end he was still less than seven tenths off the leader. "I don't think anybody else could beat this time on this motorcycle. I was on the limit, and maybe a little over the limit, riding to the absolute maximum. I'm quite pleased, though I was hoping to get below 1:52. On my quickest lap I had a small gearshifting problem a couple of times. That cost maybe one or one-and-a-half tenths each time. Not much, but enough to make a difference of one row on the grid! In any case, I did the time on my own without any slipstream, and I'm quite happy with the set-up of the bike, which is also running really well. I think there will be a big group up front tomorrow, and people will be able to see just how close 500-class racing can be. I like this track a lot, and my condition is better day by day. I had a little trouble with concentration this afternoon, but much better than yesterday."

Capirossi's team-mate Alex Barros (West Honda Pons NSR500) had a less than satisfying day at his home GP. The Brazilian favourite could only manage 12th fastest. "I thought I'd be higher up the grid for my home race," he said. "The problem is that the times are all so close, and I think I can have a good race so long as I get a good start."

Garry McCoy was 13th quickest - "We spent most of the session playing around with the set up and finished up with two very similar bikes. I think either will be fine for the race and we also have a good tyre choice for tomorrow. Once again though we suffered from not having anything with which to qualify on. While the other riders are coming in towards the end of the session, putting on their softest tyre and going 1 second quicker we are left going round on our race tyre. Whatever, I qualified on the third row here last year and still managed to lead the race for a while before finally finishing third."

Ukawa's team-mate Alex Crivillé (Repsol YPF Honda NSR500) didn't have a great day. "I've got a bad cold, so I'm feeling very weak, that's my problem here," said the Spaniard who ended up 14th fastest. "This is the last race of the year so I want to get a good result, I just hope I feel better tomorrow."

Australia's Anthony West has finished the top rider on a V-Twin machine in qualifying for tomorrow's Rio Motorcycle Grand Prix in Brazil.

The 20-year-old will start the 16th and final round of this year's 500cc world championship on the fourth row of the grid after qualifying 16th on a Dee Cee Racing Honda V-Twin.

West earned his grid position by clocking a best lap time of 1-min 53.764-secs around the 4.9km Nelson Piquet circuit in today's second and final qualifying session. He set the time on his 20th of 23 laps.

Next best among the riders on two-cylinder machines was former 125cc world champion Haruchika Aoki of Japan, who qualifying 17th on a Arie Molenaar Racing Honda NSR500V with a time 0.555-secs slower than West.

West's qualifying time was 2.333-secs behind the pole time of 1m51.431s. Ukawa's four-cylinder works Honda had a top speed advantage of 25.1-km/h over West's machine in today's qualifying session.

Anthony West - "Yesterday I went out in the last 10-minutes to try and get back in front of (Haruchika) Aoki, and the engine cracked a cylinder head. That leaked water into the crankcase and pumped oil out onto my boots. So Aoki was still quicker yesterday. This morning (second practice session) was better and I got another one-and-a-half seconds, but I had a couple of problems in the afternoon (second qualifying session). On the change from third to fourth gear it kept jumping back – not every time, but every other lap or so. I like to get three or four laps in a row to build up my rhythm, but I couldn't do that. This is not the best track for a V-Twin. The last two sections are okay and my times are in the top 10 for that part. But there's a really long back straight and I'm losing half-a-second every time against the four-cylinder bikes. We haven't done anything different to my bike – just running it as usual. It's running okay. I haven't settled any plans for next year yet, but my management is working on it. I want to stay in the top class. It's hard to predict what will happen with the mixed two-stroke and four-stroke races, but it's important to stay in, and there seem to be a couple of options."

Noriyuki Haga has a tooth infection and will not start tomorrow's race.  "The pain got really bad during the night and this morning the doctors had to drain the fluid from underneath the infected tooth. My face was so swollen that I couldn't even get my helmet on! It was been decided that I won't race tomorrow."

1.  Tohru UKAWA Repsol YPF Honda Team 1'51.431
2.  Loris CAPIROSSI West Honda Pons 1'51.462
3.  Kenny ROBERTS Telefonica Movistar Suzuki 1'51.767
4.  Shinya NAKANO Gauloises Yamaha Tech 3 1'51.820
5.  Valentino ROSSI Nastro Azzuro Honda 1'51.863
6.  Sete GIBERNAU Telefonica Movistar Suzuki 1'51.874
7.  Carlos CHECA Marlboro Yamaha Team 1'51.920
8.  Olivier JACQUE Gauloises Yamaha Tech 3 1'51.974
9.  Norick ABE Antena 3 Yamaha D'antin 1'51.993
10. Max BIAGGI Marlboro Yamaha Team  1'52.011
11. J. VD GOORBERGH Proton Team KR 1'52.109
12. Alex BARROS West Honda Pons 1'52.177
13. Garry McCOY Red Bull Yamaha WCM 1'52.324
14. Alex CRIVILLE Repsol YPF Honda Team 1'52.771
15. J.L. CARDOSO Antena 3 Yamaha D'antin 1'53.050
16. Anthony West Dee Cee Jeans Racing Team Honda 1'53.764s
17. Leon Haslam Shell Advance Honda 1'54.557s
18. Haruchika Aoki Arie Molenaar Racing 1'55.376s
19. Brendan Clarke Shell Advance Honda 1'56.524s
20. Barry Veneman Dee Cee Jeans Racing Team Honda 1'56.776s