The Desmosedicis have once again dominated the top speed charts throughout the Chinese Grand Prix weekend, with only Honda's
Dani Pedrosa able to prevent a perfect top four sweep of every session - the Spaniard clocking the second fastest top speed during Friday afternoon.
However, riders are much more wary of giving a tow to their opponents in qualifying - producing a more realistic indication of ultimate engine performance along the huge 1.2km back straight, the longest in
MotoGP - and it was under those circumstances that the Desmosedicis were once again unchallenged.
Factory rider
Marco Melandri was fastest of all, setting a 327.6km/h (203.6mph), with
Sylvain Guintoli second on 327.1km/h (203.3mph) - indicating there is little difference in engine output between the factory and satellite machines. Then came world champion
Casey Stoner with 324.0km/h (201.3mph) and Guintoli's Alice team-mate
Toni Elias 321.9km/h (200.0mph).
The leading non-Ducati was
Valentino Rossi's factory Yamaha, which reached 318.5km/h (197.9mph), followed by pole sitter
Colin Edwards, whose Michelin-shod Tech 3 Yamaha hit 317.8 km/h (197.5mph).
Despite qualifying last on the grid,
Anthony West's Kawasaki was the next fastest with 316.6km/h (196.7mph) - a speed 2.8km/h higher than team-mate
John Hopkins, who was only 15th quickest through the speed trap.
The top Honda was the Bridgestone-shod satellite machine of
Shinya Nakano, in ninth (316.5km/h), with the diminutive Pedrosa unsurprisingly the first of the Repsol factory bikes - but in a disappointing eleventh (315.7km/h) on the list.
Of the slowest eight bikes in qualifying, five were Hondas, suggesting that the RC212V's spring-valve engine is struggling in that department against its desmodromic/pneumatic valve rivals, although Suzuki looks to need the most top speed progress.
