Few would be surprised to find
MotoGP world champion
Casey Stoner on top of the timesheets after Friday practice for the inaugural MotoGP night race at Qatar - but he was hounded all the way by rookie
Jorge Lorenzo, with fellow newcomer
James Toseland the top satellite rider in third!
Add to that a bizarre collision between multiple world champions
Dani Pedrosa and
Valentino Rossi, which left the Spaniard tumbling through the floodlit Losail gravel, and the opening night of competitive 2008 track action provided plenty of surprises.
Stoner had been just 0.054secs faster than Lorenzo during Friday evening's first practice session and the pair traded the top spot repeatedly during the second hour, until Stoner set what turned out to be the fastest lap of the night with 22 minutes to go.
But the Ducati star had only managed to edge 0.049secs clear of the Fiat Yamaha rider and the reigning double 250cc world champion launched an impressive attack during his remaining laps - repeatedly dipping as much as 0.24secs under the Australian's best time heading into the final sector, only for Stoner's straight-line advantage to keep the Desmosedici rider on top.
Nevertheless, Lorenzo finished the session just 0.011secs behind the #1 and the supremely confident Spaniard will surely have his sights on an incredible debut pole position during Saturday's qualifying session, when the extra corner speed provided by qualifying tyres could help overturn Casey's dominance.
Lorenzo led a trio of Michelin-shod Yamahas on Friday, with double World Superbike champion Toseland 0.370secs from Stoner on his satellite (valve-spring powered) Tech 3 Yamaha. The Englishman was all-smiles after an excellent session, in which he outpaced veteran team-mate
Colin Edwards by 0.130secs and erased the memories of a first session fall.
The leading Honda rider was JiR's rookie
Andrea Dovizioso in fifth position, with fellow 250 graduate
Alex de Angelis the next best
Bridgestone rider after Stoner, in sixth place on his Gresini Honda.
