Valentino Rossi says he was relieved just to qualify on the front row of the grid after struggling with the setup of his Yamaha in today's MotoGP qualifying session at Indianapolis. The reigning world champion pipped Alex de Angelis to third on the grid by just 0.011s, but was more than eight tenths slower than polesitter Dani Pedrosa.
"I could have done better, but in any case we are not competitive," Rossi told Italia1 television. "We've worked on the bike but we haven't yet found the solution. I don't have enough grip and I struggled a lot both with the hard and the soft tire. Now we need to understand why and try to improve tomorrow because we must try to go a bit quicker.
"The front row is extremely important especially for tomorrow, for the race, because starting from the front row makes a lot of difference. I managed to beat de Angelis by a whisker, so in the end it went well. I'm not quick in Turn 4, but in general too I can't ride the way I want, so I need to try not to do too badly. Let's hope we can find some feeling for tomorrow."
Rossi admitted that Pedrosa has had the measure of himself and Yamaha teammate Jorge Lorenzo so far this weekend.
"Pedrosa is a monster here, yesterday in the rain and today in the dry he's shown a pace that Jorge and I can't do," said Rossi.