Rossi reigns on day one at Phillip Island

Valentino Rossi continued to reign supreme as MotoGP returned to Phillip Island
today with the recently crowned World Champion on top form in free practice at
his favourite track. After taking victory here for the past four seasons Rossi
made his intentions of extending his reign for a further year perfectly clear
with a scorching lap of 1'30.349 - a time which was inside the current circuit
record and over a second too fast for all but three riders to contend with.

"This was a fantastic first day for us, especially the afternoon," said Rossi.
"In the race at Sepang a few weeks ago we had a few problems even though we had
been very fast in preseason, and here it has been the opposite way around. We
had a few difficulties in the morning but we worked them out in the afternoon
and found a really good setting. The balance of the bike is excellent and when
you have a good feeling at this circuit you can have a lot of fun."

Kenny Roberts and Loris Capirossi will both miss out on the rest of the
weekend's action after falling at high speed in this morning's opening session.
Roberts fractured his left wrist when he crashed his Suzuki in the notoriously
difficult Doohan curve, only to be followed to the medical centre by Capirossi
after a virtually identical crash in the same corner. After initial tests the
Italian appeared fit enough to return to the track for the afternoon session but
further tests at the nearby Dandenong Private Hospital revealed internal
bruising and ruled him out of Sunday's race.

In Capirossi's absence his Ducati team-mate Carlos Checa was the only man able
to get close to Rossi today, with a late lap from the Spaniard closing the
Italian's advantage down to 0.270 seconds. Nicky Hayden and Sete Gibernau were
the only two other riders within a second of Rossi's best time, with
fifth-fastest Alex Barros some 1.110 seconds adrift of the World Champion, who
is aiming for his eleventh victory of the season.

Sebastian Porto followed up his clean sweep of pole position, lap record and
race victory last season with the fastest time in today's first qualifying
practice for the 250cc race. Porto took provisional pole position ahead of local
favourite Casey Stoner with a time of 1'33.117, with the Australian the only
rider to get within half a second of the Argentinean. Hector Barbera and Jorge
Lorenzo completed the provisional front row with reigning World Champion and
current series leader Dani Pedrosa in sixth place.

Mattia Pasini set provisional pole position for the 125cc race after a late lap
of 1'38.665 denied French youngster Mike Di Meglio by 0.163 seconds. Pasini and
Di Meglio moved to the top of the time sheets to eclipse an impressive
performance from Angel Rodriguez, who returned to action as a replacement rider
in the last round at Qatar and dominated today's session before ending up in
third place. Fabrizio Lai completed the provisional front row with the fourth
fastest time.

INFO 2005/157. 14-10-2005
DORNA COMMUNICATIONS