British MotoGP: Forecast heavy rain forces earlier start at Silverstone

Honda's Dani Pedrosa in action during the wet qualifying session

Sunday's British Grand Prix at Silverstone will start 90 minutes earlier because of forecast heavy rain.

Intermittent downpours disrupted Saturday's MotoGP qualifying sessions, after earlier track flooding led to several riders crashing in practice.

With more rain forecast, organisers have moved the start to 11:30 BST.

"This was a difficult decision to make but there is nothing more important than rider safety," Silverstone managing director Stuart Pringle said.

"The risk to the chances of not running a MotoGP race at all if we had stuck to the original schedule was too great."

Jorge Lorenzo took pole position for the race, beating fellow Ducati rider Andrea Dovizioso by 0.015 seconds. Britain's Cal Crutchlow will start fourth, with championship leader Marc Marquez in fifth.

"It looks like tomorrow could be another tricky day, possibly with heavy rain, so it will be important to analyse the track conditions and try to stay up there," said Spaniard Marquez, who leads Valentino Rossi by 59 points with eight races to go.

"We also must consider that if the conditions are like what we had at the end of [the fourth practice session], we cannot race.

"The aquaplaning was very dangerous; I nearly crashed, and many other riders fell almost one after the other.

"Depending on the situation, race direction needs to evaluate what to do, but they have a lot of experience and I'm sure they'll make the best decision."