Ben Spies

With the highest-profile moves all officially confirmed, MotoGP's Silly Season is starting to run out of steam. The big surprises are out of the way, and we are left with just over half the seats still unfilled. But even for the unsigned rides, names have already been penciled in, some rather more firmly than others. 

The two big names still waiting to put their signatures under contracts are surely Jorge Lorenzo and Dani Pedrosa. Lorenzo's Brazilian manager is said to be playing hardball with Yamaha, trying to extract the best possible conditions out of the Japanese factory now that the sales powerhouse Valentino Rossi has left Yamaha to go to Ducati. Rumors of a 14 million euro salary demand are unconfirmed, but with Spanish telecoms giant Telefonica likely to take on sponsorship of the Yamaha squad, Lorenzo might be expected to earn that in sponsorship by allying his selling power to the Telefonica brand.

Being a Texan, Ben Spies is naturally unfazed at being thrown out of the saddle

Nico Terol shows that blue can be the fastest color

Seeing eye-to-eye: Colin Edwards ...

MODERATOR: OK, ladies and gentlemen, riders are on their way. In third place, Jorge Lorenzo here at Indianapolis. (Applause) Jorge has a 68-point lead in the championship over Dani Pedrosa, of course, who won the race.  In second place, Ben Spies. (Applause) And the race winner, his third Grand Prix victory of the season, Dani Pedrosa.

Dani, you look absolutely shattered, I've got to say. I think that was, all three of you look absolutely shattered but that was a pretty tough afternoon's work.

MODERATOR: Ben, quite a weekend for you. Up and down, as it has been for I think most people here at Indianapolis. First of all, congratulations, pole position. Two weeks ago was the first front row, and now you've gone one better in pole.

BEN SPIES: Yeah, it's a dream, I mean to have a pole position at any time in MotoGP and to be able to do it in the first season on the Monster Tech 3 bike in front of the American crowd, it's great and add Indianapolis to it. It's kind of ticked all the boxes this weekend. We just got to, you know, not get ahead of ourselves, so it gives us some common edge for tomorrow but got to kind of live the moment right now. You know, it kind of took the pressure off the announcement on Friday and just knowing what's going on and am I'm really wanting to repay the Tech 3 team because they've helped put me in a place to be there and, you know, to be able to get a pole for them and hopefully can end the season good and keep being consistent and progress. But, you know, today we'll just savor the moment right now and go in tomorrow and try to put a hard 45 minutes and see what happens.

MODERATOR: It's been an interesting weekends, I think, for everybody in MotoGP, grip level has been a problem. You've crashed yourself, and the weather conditions also seem to be getting a little bit hotter.

Valentino Rossi was far from happy with his qualifying position at the Red Bull Indianapolis Grand Prix, his worst position since Valencia 2008. His attempt to improve his qualifying position had been hampered by a crash with just a few minutes left in the session, the Fiat Yamaha rider going down at Turn 6, a corner that has caught out a lot of riders so far this weekend.

Speaking to the Italian press after qualifying, Rossi complained about the surface of the track in that corner, saying "if it hadn't have been for that hole in Turn Six ... We asked for that hole to be filled in two years' ago in the Safety Commission." The crash was Rossi's second of the day, something that hadn't happened since his first season back in 1996, Rossi claimed. The cause, Rossi explained, was the rear suspension being set too hard, making it impossible for Rossi to catch the bike once it started to slide.

The industrious folks in the Indianapolis Motor Speedway press office have done part of our job again, collecting quotes from fifteen of the seventeen MotoGP riders for tomorrow's MotoGP race. Even better, they came up with a selection of fascinating statistics from today's qualifying session as well. Here's the official IMS press notes and quotes:

MotoGP QUALIFYING NOTES:

We should have known that the writing was on the wall when Valentino Rossi debuted his "Farewell" helmet at Laguna Seca

Jorge Lorenzo is redefining "unstoppable" this season

Kenny Noyes, one of three US riders crowding the Moto2 class at Indy

As we predicted yesterday, the second-worst-kept secret in MotoGP was revealed today at Indianapolis, with the official confirmation that Ben Spies is to join the factory Yamaha team for 2011. The press release issued by Yamaha held very few surprises, though one or two interesting little details are available by reading between the lines. The first is that Spies is likely to take his American crew with him to the factory team, with Spies' reference to "his mechanics" almost certainly referring to crew chief Tom Houseworth and mechanic Greg Wood.

The second is that Fiat's departure from the factory Yamaha team now seems a given. The press release speaks only of Spies riding for the Factory Yamaha Team, rather than Fiat Yamaha, the team's current designation. The move has been widely anticipated, with Fiat heavily rumored to be leaving along with Valentino Rossi, and looking at ways of being involved in the Marlboro Ducati team. The press release follows below. Official photographs are available here and here. 

MODERATOR: We said all the things, Jorge, 77 points, wins at Laguna, Indianapolis. You come here in very, very good shape.

JORGE LORENZO: Yes, I come here in very good shape. You know, all the things are going so well this year. There was sort of -- I got second position, so I couldn't ask for anything more. And we come here in a track that I love. In 2008 with a lot of rain and very hard conditions, I made my first podium in rain in my career, and last year I won. So it's always very positive that MotoGP comes here in America, and I'm happy for that.

MODERATOR: And just walking into the Motor Speedway is a special place, an iconic place, isn't it?

LORENZO: Yeah, very special with a lot of history and a lot of races here in the past. And obviously we are -- we want that this continues for long years, but I don't know whether it's going to happen for the next years.

MODERATOR: We sat here two weeks ago, not here but in the press conference in Brno in the Czech Republic, you said: "Now I think very hard about the championship. I have to be careful. Wins not so important but podiums. We just want to win the race again." Is it the same philosophy here, the same theory?