McWilliams on pole - until the straights appear.

Jeremy McWilliams once again exceeded expectations in Malaysia today, with a blindingly fast lap that not only made a nonsense of the team's fears that they would be seriously off the pace at a track with two long straights, but also put him narrowly third-fastest two-stroke, right among the four-stroke MotoGP machines.

McWilliams, in the twistier sections of the Sepang circuit, was fastest or close to fastest; but on the final T4 section, including one straight and part of the other, he was losing more than he was gaining elsewhere. He was less than one second off pole time, set by Honda four-stroke rider Tohru Ukawa, but 1.1 seconds slower on T4.

But for the straights, he would be a serious candidate for pole.

"As always, I was trying pretty hard," began McWilliams, confirmed with Aoki on the V5 for next year. " I'm less than a second off pole, and I'm losing more than a second on the two straights. That says it all, really.

"When you look at it in black and white on the time sheets, it's very frustrating. I was fastest in T2, and third in T3, so I'm picking up a bit there. I think we can make our bike quicker. My chief engineer Tom O'Kane has some ideas on how to make the engine more free revving on the straights," revealed the Brit.

Team-mate Nobuatsu Aoki was 14th fastest, and struggling with settings. To make more progress for Sunday's race, he expects to make radical changes to the machine overnight for tomorrow's final qualifying session.

"Today was really difficult," admitted the Japanese. "At Motegi, we went to very hard settings, and we brought them here too - but they didn't work at all. I have a real grip problem at the front, even worse than usual. I think tomorrow we'll go back to standard settings and begin again. It's not ideal, but always so far my team has been able to give me a good bike in time for the race, and I believe they will be able to do it again here."

Team Owner Kenny Roberts knows his riders main problem: "We really need some help on the straights, drafting faster bikes, and Jeremy (his best lap) all on his own, with no slipstreaming. It shows that if we had another 50 horsepower, we'd be beating them. Take away the second we're losing on the straight and you can see how competitive the bike can be."