Reigning world champion Jorge Lorenzo claimed his fourth-straight pole position at the MotoGP US Grand Prix on Saturday.

Lorenzo, who also earned his third pole of the season, stole the top spot in the final seconds for Sunday’s race by finishing ahead of Casey Stoner and Dani Pedrosa.

Lorenzo had the fastest time of one minute, 20.554 seconds to finish .0074sec ahead of Stoner.

“I knew Casey and Dani were going to try and take pole but I really wanted it here in America,” Lorenzo said.

“In my first two tries for a perfect lap there was a lot of traffic so I had to wait for the right moment. The important thing is tomorrow, pole position is nice but anyway the race is what counts.”

Lorenzo posted a dominant victory in Mugello in his most recent outing and has a 19-point lead in the championship standings over Pedrosa.

American Ben Spies suffered a heavy crash on Saturday but was able to hobble away from it on his own.

He finished fourth while Cal Crutchlow, showing no signs of his crash on Friday, will start from the fifth spot.