Gibernau grabs Le Mans pole.

World championship leader Sete Gibernau carried his morning practice pace through to final qualifying for the French Grand Prix, the Telefonica Honda rider emerging on top by just 0.15secs over Carlos Checa on a day when Valentino Rossi was left off the front row.

Yesterday, Gibernau's team-mate Colin Edwards had made his mark on MotoGP by taking his first ever provisional pole, courtesy of a new 1min 33.870secs Le Mans lap record on the resurfaced circuit.

Nicky Hayden claimed the second fastest time, just 0.096secs slower than his fellow American to push top Yamaha man Checa to the outside of the provisional front row, despite the Spaniard dominating much of the session.

Fellow M1 rider Marco Melandri continued his impressive start to the season with fourth, one row ahead of Yamaha colleague - and reigning world champion - Rossi, who was edged out to seventh by Gibernau and Makoto Tamada. Rossi was joined on the provisional third row by Max Biaggi and Shinya Nakano.

Into today's final session and within ten-minutes the red flags were waving following an engine failure for Alex Hofmann's Kawasaki. Hofmann kept control of his ZX-RR, but it dropped oil all along the start/finish straight and onto the entry of the flat out turn one, before the German was able to slow down and take to the gravel.

A fifteen-minute clean-up then followed before the now 23-rider field - Aprilia's Shane Byrne will take no further part in the weekend due to a lack of strength in his broken hand - returned to action...

...and just five-minutes later Hofmann's second machine suffered an identical failure, spewing blue smoke as it entered the back straight and forcing a clearly frustrated Alex to abandon the bike by a tyre wall and seek alternative transport to reach the Eckl pits. Fortunately, no red flag was required.

Meanwhile, the first improvement in the top ten would take place just before the halfway stage when Checa trimmed his Friday time to within 0.144secs of pole, but maintained third.

Edwards' overnight pole would remain the time to beat as the final ten minutes began, by which time Biaggi was just 0.022secs behind, but it would be the Roman's former team-mate Checa who finally toppled the Texan.

Carlos hit the front by 0.198secs from the non-improving Edwards, but would hold the position for just two-minutes before fellow Spaniard Gibernau shot to the top by a further 0.247secs.

Rossi was next to threaten as the Italian superstar took third, but was almost instantly knocked from the front row by Biaggi's return to the runner-up spot, 0.154secs from Sete.

Into the final three-minutes and with frantic last minute tyre changes complete the frontrunners returned for their final pole attack... except Biaggi, who pitted too late to record a further flying lap.

Fortunately for the Camel Honda rider he would keep his front row start after only Checa was able to benefit from a final lap, the Gauloises Fortuna Yamaha rider taking second and pushing team-mate Rossi off the front row as a result.

Joining the #46 on the second row tomorrow will be Edwards, punished for not improving today, and Tech 3 Yamaha rider Melandri - the young Italian making it an equal Honda/Yamaha split of the top six positions.

Row three will see Hayden (who didn't improve) and Tamada alongside the top Ducati of Loris Capirossi, the #65 having outpaced team-mate Bayliss by less than 0.1secs.

Shinya Nakano salvaged twelfth for Kawasaki, and ahead of the top Suzuki of Kenny Roberts, but his team-mate Hofmann was left nineteenth after his machinery troubles.

The two Proton KRs and WCMs will complete tomorrow's grid field, but it was a tough end to the hour for Burns who fell from his machine at high speed.

Final qualifying:

1. Gibernau
2. Checa
3. Biaggi
4. Rossi
5. Edwards
6. Melandri
7. Hayden
8. Tamada
9. Capirossi
10. Bayliss
11. Barros
12. Nakano
13. Kenny Roberts
14. Hodgson
15. Xaus
16. Hopkins
17. Abe
18. McWilliams
19. Hofmann
20. Aoki
21. Roberts
22. Byrne
23. Fabrizio
24. Burns