Lorenzo: Valencia pole lap was “best in all my life”

Lorenzo, who enters the final race of the year seven points behind Yamaha teammate Valentino Rossi, set an unbeatable time of 1m30.011s.

“The most important and, I think, my best lap - in all my life,” he said. “I couldn't believe when I saw 30.0, I couldn't believe.

“The previous lap, I pushed at the maximum and I just made 30.9. Then in the second try I improve one second. Unbelievable, no?

“I just made perfect braking, perfect acceleration, I picked up the bike so well, got so much traction. I think if I tried to repeat this 50 times, 100 times, I couldn't do this laptime, it was unbelievable.

“Very happy with the pole position, very happy with the grid for tomorrow because it's very important to start well and to avoid some problems. Let's see if tomorrow is more or less the same as today.”

While Lorenzo will start on pole, Rossi will start at the back of the grid due to his penalty for colliding with Honda’s Marc Marquez in Malaysia.

Marquez pays tribute to “incredible lap”

Marquez will start second, having seen his 2013 pole position record time obliterated by Lorenzo.

“I tried to do a good lap, especially with the first tyre I did a few mistakes and then with the last tyre again I did a few mistakes,” said Marquez.

“So it was not a perfect lap, but even like this, Jorge did an incredible lap, for me it was difficult to improve that laptime.”