Nicky Hayden confirmed his improved form in the second half of the season by taking his first pole position of the season at Estoril. Hayden edged out Casey Stoner in last minutes of the session by only 0.04 seconds. Valentino Rossi took the remaining spot on the front row, 0.275 seconds behind Hayden.Makoto Tamada, Dani Pedrosa and Colin Edwards round out the 2nd row.

Nicky Hayden, Repsol Honda
This pole is a big thank-you to the team who have stuck with me and worked so hard during the dark times. In the last section I knew I just had to pull out the pin and go for it because I had nothing to lose. It was so good to return to pit lane and see everybody smiling again. I want to lead into the first turn tomorrow and have some fun.

We've improved by half a second in each session and as much as I'd like to say it was all down to me, really the team has made some good adjustments to the machine. The harder this year's got the harder they've worked for me so I'm really happy to give them something to smile about. We've still got to improve a lot on race tyres but we're in a good position. The qualifying laps were pretty good and I improved by half a second from the first to the second which is what you've got to do if you want to get up front so I'm happy with how today has gone. Let's hope we can keep it rolling tomorrow.

Casey Stoner, Marlboro Ducati
We are very happy with the way things have gone today and over the weekend in general, so we're very confident. The team has done a great job, we found a very good setting immediately and we have a very good feeling with the bike, so I think everything is looking good for the race. During today's two sessions we put race distance on two race tyres and we were still running some pretty good lap times and feeling quite comfortable on old tyres, so it's been a very positive day in that way. This track is pretty hard work for the tyres, so tyre degradation is going to be a very important factor at the end of the race. I'm quite happy with the set-up we've got, we just need to refine it a bit tomorrow morning to improve the traction to understand how the tyre will be at the end of the race, then we'll see what happens. We thought we had a chance at pole this afternoon and we were close - things seem to be going quite well for us this year.

Valentino Rossi - Fiat Yamaha
We've been fast for all the practice sessions so far here and we have found a good rhythm so things are looking quite positive. It's good to be on the front row, of course pole is always the target but the most important thing is to be on the front row in order to give ourselves the best chance. I tried a new kind of qualifying tyre today but it didn't work so I only had one lap, but luckily I was able to do a good time, even if I might have improved with one more tyre. The new Michelin race tyres are working well here and the other Michelin riders are fast too so we can hopefully all be close to Stoner tomorrow. I hope that we can fight with him, make some good passes and have some fun, especially in the first part of the race. I'm happy with the work we've done and with the setting we've found; our Yamaha is working well in the tight corners on this track and we're excited about a good race tomorrow.

Estoril Qualifying Results: