Hayden seizes Sachsenring pole.

Repsol Honda's Nicky Hayden has claimed his second premier-class pole position after leading an all-Honda top three in this afternoon's qualifying session for the German Grand Prix at Sachsenring.

Final free practice had seen Ducati's Loris Capirossi rise to the top with the fastest lap of the weekend so far, set on his penultimate circulation of the morning session. The Italian ended the hour 0.057secs in front of Honda's Sete Gibernau, with Hayden 0.234secs back in third.

Capirossi's best, of 1min 23.739secs, was a mere 0.069secs quicker than the fastest Friday time, set by Camel Honda's Alex Barros (fourth this morning), while world champion Valentino Rossi improved from just 13th yesterday to 8th, but was still 0.2secs behind Yamaha team-mate Colin Edwards (fifth fastest) and 0.465secs slower than Loris.

Into the qualifying hour and with just five-minutes gone Kenny Roberts had broken the 1min 24secs barrier - the Suzuki rider, runner-up in the wet of Donington Park six days ago, looking to have used a very early qualifying tyre to immediately beat his previous best lap time of the weekend by half a second.

But he wasn't unchallenged, with Repsol Honda team-mates Max Biaggi and Nicky Hayden - and then Movistar Honda's Sete Gibernau - all moving ahead of the 2000 world champion, with their own best 2005 Sachsenring laps, in the following minutes.

Gibernau led the pack with a 1min 23.572secs at that stage, but they were still some way off the 2004 pole time of 1min 22.756secs set by Biaggi. However, Roberts was soon leading the field ever further towards that time, the American initially returning to the top by just 0.067secs, before extending his advantage to a considerable (for such a short circuit) 0.338secs with 22-minutes gone.

By the halfway mark the injured Hopkins, who broke a bone in his foot and chipped some teeth - amongst other injuries - during a fourth gear Friday highside, had made it a Suzuki one-two, the Anglo-American guiding his GSV-R to within 0.062secs of Roberts, with Checa, Gibernau, Biaggi and Rossi completing the midway top six.

Gibernau returned to the top by 0.29secs with 20-minutes to go, while sixth fastest Checa saw his qualifying hopes take a dramatic turn for the worst after he was thrown from his Desmosedici.

The Spaniard's machine had started kicking at the top of the downhill plunge that ends the lap and, despite Checa's best efforts to hold on, would get gradually worse until the rear wheel finally dug in and sent the #7 literally somersaulting over the handlebars. Fortunately, after sliding most of the way down the steep hill, Checa was able to walk away and would rejoin in the closing stages.

Meanwhile, with the final ten-minutes approaching, Barros moved into second - just 0.043secs from Sete - but then suffered his third fall in two days after again losing the front of his yellow RCV, this time as he tipped into turn one.

With the Barros threat over, Gibernau continued to hold pole - courtesy of his earlier time - right up to the final three-minutes, when Hayden suddenly burst ahead by 0.104secs. The Kentuckian, with no time for a further tyre change, was then forced to watch his rivals try, and ultimately fail, to beat his best before celebrating his second pole (after Laguna Seca).

Gibernau and Barros will join Hayden on tomorrow's all-Honda front row while world champion Valentino Rossi took his ill-handling Yamaha to fourth on his penultimate lap, but is just 0.188secs from pole. The Italian will be joined on row two by countryman Marco Melandri and Biaggi, while Edwards, Capirossi and earlier pace setter Roberts complete row three.

The injured Hopkins rounded out the top ten, with Checa reduced to eleventh after his fall and will start one place ahead of the top Kawasaki, of Shinya Nakano, which was a disappointing 12th fastest today.

The top nine riders are all within 0.5secs of Hayden, with the top 14 within one-second of the #69.

Full times to follow...

Qualifying:

1. Hayden
2. Gibernau
3. Barros
4. Rossi
5. Melandri
6. Biaggi
7. Edwards
8. Capirossi
9. Roberts
10. Hopkins
11. Checa
12. Nakano
13. Hofmann
14. Jacque
15. Tamada
16. Bayliss
17. Elias
18. Xaus
19. Ellison
20. Rolfo
21. Byrne
22. Battaini