Crutchlow started the race from 11th on the grid, but found himself running in the top 5 after Alvaro Bautista’s crash took out Hayden, Rossi, and De Puniet.

Crutchlow then found himself locked in battle with Karel Abraham, the only other rider in contention for the Rookie of the Year title. The battle lasted until the very last lap and it ended when Abraham struck the rear of Crutchlow’s bike and crashed off into the dirt.

Crutchlow will now remain in Valencia for the testing session that begins on Tuesday, where he will get his first taste of the Yamaha 1000cc, and will team up with his new Tech 3 team-mate, Andrea Dovizioso, for the first time.

Cal Crutchlow gives his thoughts on the Valencia MotoGP below:

Cal Crutchlow 4th – 70 points:
“That was a pretty dramatic way to finish the season and I am obviously thrilled to win the Rookie of the Year title. But I’m equally happy to have finished in fourth place because that was an incredibly difficult race. I’m not sure what happened at the first corner but I came out of it in sixth place and just pushed as hard as I could. It was a really intense battle with Karel right to the end and both of us were giving it everything we had. The track was so greasy it felt like you could crash so easily and when the rain started getting heavier I just got my head down again and kept pushing. I started to catch Dani really fast and I wasn’t sure if he had a problem or whether I was pushing too hard. I slowed down because of that and Karel caught me back up, so it came down to the last lap and he obviously made a small mistake. He hit me from behind but I managed to stay on and to finish the season with my best ever result is a great way to start planning for 2012. This year has been an incredible learning experience and we have a lot to work on for next season, but I feel confident I can make the step to the next level. I can hold my held up high and now I am looking forward to getting my first experience of the Yamaha 1000cc bike on Tuesday.”

Casey Stoner needs a 10 point advantage in the championship standings to mathematically secure the 2011 World Title, and Jorge Lorenzo will try to keep the pressure on Casey Stoner for as long as possible.

Lorenzo came out fighting for today’s qualifying session and was on the pace quickly, but it was not enpugh to hold off Casey Stoner and he eventually had to concede pole position to Stoner.

Ben Spies had a tough qualifying session, the American crashed out after suffering a high-speed low side on his third lap. Spies was taken to the clinic for check-ups and eventually returned to the track on his second bike. Despite heavy bruising, SPies was able to get himself into 7th place on the grid for tomorrow’s race.

Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time 1.30.448 – Laps 24
“We did a very good job today. We tried many things and I believe we have the right set up for tomorrow. I have to thank my team who worked hard to make sure I have the best possible bike to fight with. The race will be very tough, it will be very important to be consistent with a good race pace. I will try to win, I know it will be very difficult here with Casey but I will try!”

Ben Spies – Position 7th – Time 1.30.835 – Laps 20
“I got a little bit off line in qualifying this afternoon and hit a big bump, losing the front. It’s unfortunate as we were trying a different bike set up which was looking pretty good. It happened on the third lap, according to the data I came off at 270km/hr so I went through the gravel trap pretty quick! My knees, ribs and elbows are all pretty banged up but that’s normal, that’s how it is. The bike is working well so we need a good start; we’re in a good position on the grid for it so we’ll see what happens.”

Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“A good qualifying for us, Jorge was more than half a second quicker than this morning’s final practice so we are quite pleased. Again another strange session, some parts of the track lost some grip which seemed to affect everybody. We haven’t decided on tyres for tomorrow yet but the bike feels good for him and we are looking forward to the race. It’s going to be difficult to stop Casey but we’ll do our best.”

Massimo Meregalli – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Director
“The race is not going to be easy tomorrow. Jorge is starting from the first row which is important, I’m sure he won’t give up until the end and he will have to put all his efforts in for the whole 27 laps. Despite a bad crash Ben managed to qualify in seventh. This wasn’t so bad considering, as I didn’t expect that result. He’s very sore all over but he still pushed hard and did all he could. Tomorrow will be tough and painful for him but we know him and we know he will give 100%.”

Spies struggled in the morning session and finished 8th, but managed to adapt his set-up for the second session to finish in 4th.

Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time 1.30.744 – Laps 24
“Today I felt great in the morning but in the afternoon not as good. It was impossible to replicate the lap time from the morning. We were up to five tenths slower and I’m not sure why, maybe the track conditions were different, anyway we’ll see what happens tomorrow. We know that Casey is very fast here but today he wasn’t so quick. We must try to win and if not possible fight for the podium on Sunday.”

Ben Spies – Position 5th – Time 1.31.495 – Laps 36
“I’m feeling good today; we started this morning with both bikes not working so well so we knew we had to come up with something this afternoon. The second session we were working really well but still struggling in a few areas we need to make better tomorrow. I think we definitely can and if we do I can see us dropping up to half a second pretty easily. It’s up to the boys; we know what the problem is we just need to work out how to fix it. As always I’m going to try the best I can to make it interesting for the fans and get up there.”

Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“It was quite a good day for us today, the morning session especially was a little bit better than the afternoon. Everybody seemed to have less speed on the straight which was strange as there wasn’t much wind. Jorge feels confident on the bike and has space to improve, especially with rear grip. The gap between him and Casey was quite close this morning so we are quite satisfied with the first day.”

Massimo Meregalli – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Director
“We had some problems from the morning session with Ben which we partly solved in the afternoon allowing him to get more and more comfortable on the bike. There are still some points where we have to improve and work on but it seems that we know what we need to do. Hopefully the track will be dry tomorrow morning so we can see if we get the results we expect from the changes. Overall the pace is good and our tyre choice is almost done so for a first day we’ve done a great job. Jorge was very quick to find a good pace this morning. He still needs to find something but we are confident he will also make another step tomorrow.”

Cal Crutchlow fought off a heavy cold to finish just over 0.1s away from claiming a starting position on the third row of the grid for tomorrow’s Japanese MotoGP race at the end of a closely contested qualifying session at the Twin Ring Motegi circuit.

The British rider will start the 15th round of the 2011 World Championship from 12th on the grid after yet another encouraging performance on board the Monster Yamaha Tech 3 YZR-M1 machine.

Crutchlow’s best time of 1.46.818 was almost 0.3s quicker than the 2010 pole position time and his pace was less than 0.4s away from Valentino Rossi in seventh position. Today’s result was reward for Crutchlow’s determination after he was struck by a nasty head cold overnight, which left the 25-year-old with a severe sore throat.

Crutchlow is hoping a good night’s rest will help him return to 100 per cent as he looks to continue his fine recent run of form in tomorrow’s 24-lap race. He is seeking a third successive top 10 finish to strengthen his bid for the coveted Rookie of the Year title.

Today’s qualifying session, which took place in much cooler conditions compared to practice yesterday, didn’t go according to plan for experienced team-mate Colin Edwards.

The 37-year-old had high hopes of a strong performance after claiming a season best fifth place at the Twin Ring Motegi last year. Edwards qualified fifth in 2010 but despite lapping 0.3s faster this afternoon, his best time of 1.47.165 could only secure him 14th on the grid for Yamaha’s all-important home race.

Edwards suffered an early setback when he crashed with only a quarter of the 60-minute session completed. Edwards ran off the track at Turn 3 while pushing hard to improve his pace on his eighth lap. He ran into the gravel at high speed and despite his best efforts he was unable to keep his Monster Yamaha Tech 3 Team machine upright.

He quickly adjusted to a different front-end geometry setting on his spare YZR-M1 machine to finish just over 0.3s behind Crutchlow.

Cal Crutchlow 12th 1.46.818 – 25 laps:
“I’m a bit disappointed to be back in 12th when you look how close I am to the third row. But I can’t be too upset because I feel well below my physical best today. All last night I was coughing and sneezing and I’ve been drinking about eight litres of water today and I still feel dehydrated. My throat feels like I’ve swallowed gravel but I still managed to go out there and lap faster than last year’s pole time. I can’t really ask for much more than that on a circuit I’ve never even seen before in my life. I might have been a bit further up the grid but on my last soft tyre I nearly high-sided coming out of the first corner. It was a big moment because I struggled to get heat into the tyre out of the pits. I still got in one more lap on that final tyre and managed to set my best time, so now I’m looking forward to the race and hoping I can have another good battle like I did at the Motorland Aragon. That was a lot of fun but also helped me learn a lot, so I’ll be looking to be in a fight for the top 10.”

Colin Edwards 14th 1.47.165 – 22 laps:
“I had high hopes coming to Japan because last year I got my best grid position and my best result of the Championship at the Twin Ring Motegi. But it just hasn’t worked out at all so far this weekend and I’m just not quick enough. I’m faster than I qualified last year but still nine places further back down the grid, so that shows how much the competition has stepped up this season. The early crash didn’t help the session run smoothly and I haven’t made a mistake as bad as that in a long time. I just completely missed my braking marker and that was all because I was pushing too hard to get more out of the bike. Looking at the lap times it is obvious that our bike doesn’t turn or accelerate as good as the rest and that means you have to ride on the ragged edge a lot. The strange part is that the bike feels fine. It is not doing anything crazy but I can’t get it to go round the track any faster. The target will be to fight for the top 10 tomorrow, but a repeat of fifth like last year unfortunately doesn’t look like it’s a realistic aim.”

Spies had to all but abandon the second free practice session and will be seeking treatment from the Clinica in order to improve things for tomorrow’s qualifying session.

Jorge Lorenzo is not without issues of his own, despite a solid start it seems that it will take a lot of work in order to beat the 3 Repsol Honda’s that dominated both Free Practice sessions.

Jorge Lorenzo:
“We improved the lap time quite a lot from the morning to the afternoon session but it’s still not enough, the competition is very strong here. It is going to be a very difficult weekend to fight for the podium and the victory. We are trying some things on the bike to improve the stability on braking and into corners. We found a little but still need to find some more! We are fifth which could be worse today.”

Ben Spies:
“What a shocking start to the weekend, I don’t think I’ve ever been as sick as I was on the journey over here, I was nearly not allowed on the plane. I’m slowly getting my strength back thanks to the great guys at Clinica but didn’t have enough to ride properly in the second session. I started to get tunnel vision on the straight and just felt it was too dangerous to be out there. I’m working with Clinica today and tomorrow and am sure things will be a bit better for qualifying and the race. I’m really sorry for my team and all the Japanese fans who came to watch today.”

Jorge Lorenzo made the weekend’s hard work count today, taking his first ever Aragon Grand Prix podium with third place. Having dropped from fourth on the grid in the early laps, the reigning World Champion gradually picked up the pace, running well under his qualifying time to gradually reel in the front runners. By lap 10 he had caught both his team mate Ben Spies and Marco Simoncelli, passing them both to take third which he held to the line. The results mean the gap to Championship leader Stoner has now increased again to 44 with four races remaining of the season.

Meanwhile, Ben Spies had probably his best start of the season so far, shooting off the line to outride both Stoner and Dani Pedrosa for the lead into turn one. Having then dropped to third the Texan was maintaining a gap to fourth, scoring the third fastest lap of the race on lap four with a 1’49.593. A dramatic drop off in grip on the sixth lap then affected his pace. He was passed by team mate Lorenzo and then Simoncelli, dropping to fifth place. The result sees Spies retain fifth in the Championship standings, now 24 points behind Pedrosa in fourth as they head to Motegi next week.

Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time +14.209
“We struggled a lot from the beginning of the race, losing positions and having to recover step by step. We couldn’t get more than a podium; that is the best result we could get today! I didn’t have confidence in the rear and it is impossible to catch Dani on this track. It’s a pity, but at least I got the podium I couldn’t get last year. We are still fighting for the Championship and that’s the most important thing, we are going to Japan with hope still alive.”

Ben Spies – Position 5th – Time +27.739
“I knew the start wasn’t going to last long the way Casey and Dani were riding but I felt pretty good in the beginning. Even when we got to the fourth or fifth lap I thought our advantage to fourth place was growing. I felt really comfortable and thought we had a podium fight in us. Then the sixth or seventh lap the tyre just made a huge drop and just kept going down. Usually they make one drop then stay consistent. I had no confidence in the rear and no grip. I’m frustrated as before that we were riding well and the bike was working great.”

Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“For Jorge P3 was maximum damage control so we are happy with the result today. This morning we discussed that this was the maximum possible. Finally in the race he was going half a second faster than in qualifying which is pretty good so he must be happy to be on the podium. I’m sorry for Ben, tyre drop off means you can’t do anything; luckily we didn’t have that problem. We had a lack of grip in the beginning and couldn’t do 49s but were very consistent on low 50s which is the only reason we were able to finish in third place. The team worked really hard all weekend to deliver the best possible set up for Jorge, so a big thank you to them.”

Massimo Meregalli – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Director
“The drop in temperature this afternoon probably compromised the work we’ve done up to this morning in set up. Ben really couldn’t do more because the rear tyre was really bad after just a few laps. Jorge achieved the best result possible, I think he did good job and thinking about the final championship standings, third place is still a good result. For sure it doesn’t make it so easy but we’ll keep going to the end.”

Lorenzo had originally stated that he would not take part in the race, but since the publication of the Dorna commisioned report on environmental radiation around the Motegi circuit that declared it safe, some initial rider resistance has softened.

Yamaha also confirmed that Ben Spies will also race at Motegi. The full, but short, press release from Yamaha can be read below:

Press Release:
Yamaha Factory Racing herewith confirms the attendance of its riders Jorge Lorenzo and Ben Spies to compete for round 15 of the 2011 MotoGP World Championship at Motegi in Japan on 2nd October.

The Yamaha Factory Racing team will race in Yamaha’s WGP50th Anniversary red and white livery for the 4th time this year at the home GP of team owner Yamaha Motor Co., Ltd.

Check out the video below.

Lorenzo is now only 15 points behind Casey Stoner as the teams head to Laguna Seca.

Ben Spies and Jorge Lorenzo give their thoughts on the German MotoGP at Sachsenring below:

Jorge Lorenzo – Position 2nd – Time +1.477
“I’m very happy! It has been a fantastic race today. From the middle of the race I got very tired in my left hand so I didn’t know where I could find the force to push and keep pushing to the end. Then Casey stopped the bike a lot two corners from the end so I took profit from it, opened full throttle and in the last corner I went for it. It was a miracle pass! This race is very important so we are very proud and happy with the result. I have to thank my Yamaha crew who worked very hard to give me a fast bike all weekend, they have been fantastic.”

Ben Spies – Position 5th – Time +10.719
“Unfortunately I got to the front group a little too late but I tried as hard as I could. I just lacked some rear grip in the beginning, I tried to be consistent and hope they came back to me because I couldn’t run the pace they were running in the beginning. Lap time wise it was probably the most consistent I’ve ever done in a race. We caught up to them with three laps to go and then all hell broke loose. Simoncelli started trying to find a way past Dovizioso and every time I tried to look to go past one of them was on one side of the track and the other on the other side. It was fair play, they were racing each other but it kind of messed up my game plan! Simoncelli ran wide at the end so I got him again in the last corner. I wish we could have got Dovizioso because we had the pace, we just ran out of laps.”

Wilco Zeelenberg – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Manager
“A great result, of course we would have liked to win it but it was clear that Dani had a little bit extra, he’s very good at this track and was also strong last year. To make up four championship points in the last corner at the end of the race is of course great, especially mentally for Jorge. The rest of the season is coming up and we’re closing the gap with still a few races to go!”

Massimo Meregalli – Yamaha Factory Racing Team Director
“A good weekend for us, we are catching Stoner. I think Jorge did a really great job and a very impressive last lap. He saw a door almost open and he just went in and took the place cleanly, a perfect job. Ben had a big lack of grip but he was really consistent; he did almost all the race at the same pace. I don’t think he could have found an additional tenth of a second. Fifth place is not so bad looking at the pace and I think he could have finished fourth with a couple more laps. We are looking to Laguna Seca now, and I am confident we can make another step forward.”

Cal Crutchlow was clearly unhappy after the German MotoGP – he had a face of thunder during his BBC interview and bemoaned his lack of feeling with his Tech 3 Yamaha. Crutchlow and the team have made multiple changes to the Yamaha, but suitable front grip still eludes them.

Colin Edwards and Cal Crutchlow give their thoughts on the German MotoGP below:

Colin Edwards 10th – 59 points:
“That was a difficult race because it was one of those where you can see a few places up for grabs in front of you but you can’t do anything to try move forward. I was with Valentino, Nicky and Alvaro for pretty much the whole race but it didn’t matter what I did or tried, I couldn’t get close enough to try and pass them. One tenth round this track feels like a million because it is so short but it felt like I was on a bungee rope the whole time. Each time we started going through the series of lefts from Turn 4 onwards, they just seem to have more traction than me. They’d pull a few bike lengths on me but then I’d gain it all back in the hard braking for Turn 12 at the bottom of the hill and hard braking for the last corner. My bike was really stable on the brakes but the bike lengths I’d catch up I’d lose again on the next lap and the process would start all over again. With a few laps to go I was in Turn 2, off throttle and the rear came round. From that point on I had less grip and a bit of vibration and I couldn’t stay with them and I was making more mistakes trying to keep their pace. So I just took 10th place, which is not where I want to finish, but I’ve never gone great at this track and I’ve gone faster than I’ve ever run here. Usually it’s a disaster here, so I’m actually happy with my race and going to Laguna Seca now to race in front of my home fans, I feel really good and confident.”

Cal Crutchlow 14th – 34 points:
“Obviously I can’t be happy to have finished 14th because I believe I should be fighting inside the top ten. But taking the positives out of a difficult race, I was able to fight for the whole race with riders that are a lot more experienced than me, and who have much more knowledge of this track. I really wanted to finish 11th but when I ran wide with a few laps remaining, it was always going to be an uphill battle to get back three places on a track like this that is tight and twisty. But I didn’t give up and I pushed as hard as I could right to the end and nearly recovered a couple of places. I just didn’t have enough grip from the front or the rear and it was difficult. I didn’t feel I could push any harder and it strange because we made a lot of big changes to the bike this weekend without ever really finding an improvement. We’ve learned a few things that will help in the future and now I’m looking forward to getting to Laguna Seca where I’ll be aiming to get back inside the top ten.”

Herve Poncharal – Team Manager:
“The feeling is better than the result looks because Colin had a strong race. He had a good start and he rode most of the race together with the factory Ducati and factory Suzuki. The pace was good and I think there was not a lot more we could do. This is a tough track for Colin but his pace was pretty strong and consistent and I am happy. Cal finished 14th and he is not happy with that. I think he has learned a lot today and after a tough period it means something to finally see the chequered flag. I don’t want to say that we are happy to finish 14th, but I think together with Randy and the other Ducatis he has been learning a few things. Cal has done some really good performances in the beginning of the season, but we should never forget that it is a learning year and he has to understand that if he has to finish 14th like today, it is all about learning from that experience. The target we are working on this season is that he becomes a better MotoGP rider, even if sometimes he doesn’t get the result he expects. Now we can focus on Laguna Seca, which is a massive race for Colin and Monster, so everybody at Tech 3 Yamaha will be giving maximum effort as usual to deliver a top result in America.”