"Thanks to Max for trying so hard, he's a true professional," said YZR-M1 project leader Ichiro Yoda. "Carlos was also incredible today - he had two falls but kept getting faster. We have quite a normal set-up here, we're just searching for the best front-and-rear grip balance because the surface isn't so grippy. We don't have any new parts for this race, we're continuing to evolve the settings we used at Estoril, both for that race and during our tests after the race. Both riders still have one 'old' chassis and one new chassis each, because it seems that each chassis still has positive and negative points. So far here, Max prefers the old one, Carlos the new."

Max Biaggi dominated this afternoon's opening qualifying session, putting his Marlboro Yamaha Team M1 on provisional pole, just 0.012 seconds ahead of Valentino Rossi (Honda). And the Italian might have been even faster if he hadn't run straight on at the end of Rio's long back straight while he was on another hot lap with three minutes to go.

"It's a good feeling to be up front on day one," said Biaggi, currently chasing second overall in the 2002 MotoGP World Championship. "The track is very slippery, so it isn't easy to find good traction, it's just a case of controlling wheelspin and slides with your throttle hand. I pushed hard today and I've been very focused since the start of morning practice,  thinking about how to use my favourite parts of the track to my advantage. I know I can go faster tomorrow but I also know that the other guys will be quicker. My thanks to my crew - the staff in this team are working so hard and the engineers and technicians are doing an excellent job."

Carlos Checa slid off twice during today's two sessions but that didn't stop the ultra-determined Marlboro Yamaha Team man from going third fastest, just 0.121 seconds off provisional pole position. Checa tumbled at slow speed this morning, possibly on fluid dropped by another machine, then again after 20 minutes of this afternoon's session.

"We've been having some front-end push problems here," explained the Spaniard. "This morning I think there was some coolant on the track, but this afternoon I was just pushing a little too hard when things weren't exactly right. We did improve the front end but we need to work on this some more, at the moment I can do one fast lap but it's not comfortable to keep pushing for much longer than that. I'm concentrating on the new chassis because this is the direction I want to take for the future."

World Championship leader Valentino Rossi was outpaced for provisional pole today but only just. "Since this morning we've worked on the front suspension to make the bike turn better, but I still need more feeling from the front," said the Italian, winner of nine races so far this year. Local favourite Alex Barros (Honda) ended the day as top two-stroke rider in fourth place. Just 1.162 seconds covered the quickest 15 riders.

------   Red Bull Report   ------

Garry McCoy showed he is close to recapturing his best form in today's opening qualifying session for the Rio GP when he qualified his Red Bull Yamaha YZR500 in 10th place.  The 30-year-old Australian ended the session just over half-a-second off Max Biaggi's provisional pole time as the only South American race on the MotoGP calendar got underway in searing temperatures this afternoon at the Jacarepagua circuit.  Today's track temperature peaked at 45 degrees.

McCoy's best time of 1.52.490 was one second faster than he set on the opening day of qualifying at the same circuit last season, showing his confidence is fully restored after an injury-hit campaign.  McCoy elevated himself up to sixth with only eight minutes of the session remaining, but in the typically frantic closing stages, he found himself relegated down the order before producing his fastest time on his last lap to leave some of the highly-fancied four-stroke machines trailing behind him.

Team-mate John Hopkins found himself down in 19th place on his debut appearance at the Rio track, although his best time of 1.53.563 was only 1.7s off the provisional pole. He found the notoriously bumpy circuit as added burden to trying to learn the track.

GARRY McCOY ­ 10th 1.52.490 - "As usual here it is hard work because of the bumps and the heat but I've no complaints about the balance of the bike. On my final run I went out behind Norick Abe but I lost a lap hanging around waiting for him. In the end I just went for it and I had Tohru Ukawa in my sights. I was just trying to hunt him down but those four-strokes really pull away on the long straights here."

JOHN HOPKINS ­ 19th 1.53.563 - "I'm just trying to learn the track. What I have learned already is that the surface is really bumpy. I'm trying to work out the best lines because I've noticed the other guys use different lines to me as they know where the bumps are. We haven't really played around with the set-up at all because it is difficult to make changes when I'm still trying to learn the circuit. We'll change the suspension settings tomorrow to try and make the bike ride the bumps better and I'm confident the times will come down."

PETER CLIFFORD ­ DIRECTOR OF RACING - "It's great to see Garry getting back to his best after all his injury problems and he's already a second faster than he was in the first qualifying session here last year. For John to be such a short distance off the pace on his first visit to such a difficult circuit is another excellent performance."