Valentino Rossi on pole for home Italian Grand Prix

ByReuters

Published 21/05/2016 at 17:11 GMT+1

Yamaha's Valentino Rossi will start his home Italian Grand Prix on pole position with future team mate Maverick Vinales alongside on the front row for Sunday's MotoGP race.

Valentino Rossi, Maverick Vinales, GP Francia, MotoGP AFP

Image credit: AFP

The 37-year-old nine times world champion left it late, putting on a new rear tyre five minutes from the end of the session and then clocking a best lap of one minute 46.504 seconds.

Rossi's 53rd career pole in the top category, and second of the season, was his first at the Mugello circuit near Florence since 2008.

"We followed the right strategy in the right moment of qualifying and I am very happy to start from first position," he said.

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Vinales, who is moving from Suzuki to Yamaha at the end of the year, was 0.094 slower while Andrea Iannone completed the front row for Ducati.

Yamaha's world champion and overall leader Jorge Lorenzo will start fifth, with Honda's Marc Marquez fourth.

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