Lorenzo Takes Easy Win in Catalunya

Jorge Lorenzo made it three in a row in this year’s MotoGP, after taking a dominant win at his home grand prix, in Catalunya. The Spanish rider from Yamaha had only one true rival for victory on Sunday, Honda’s Andrea Dovizioso, but the Italian crashed out midway through the race and eventually handed Lorenzo a 4-second winning margin at the chequered flag.

Starting from pole position in Catalunya, Lorenzo had no response to Honda’s Dani Pedrosa sensational sprint from the second row all the way to the leading position. However, in the first corner of the circuit, the Spaniard ran wide and lost no less than 10 positions, after which he fought back to 4th place in the next 5 laps.

That left Lorenzo in the leading spot, while followed closely by Dovizioso and Ducati’s Casey Stoner. The Ducati rider made the same mistake as Pedrosa in the first corner of Lap 6 however and dropped no less than 2 positions down to 5th place. In a matter of laps, he overtook 4th placed Randy de Puniet and set up a great duel for 3rd place (which was to become the battle for the runner-up spot, after Dovizioso’s bad moment) with Pedrosa.

Midway through the race, Dovizioso experienced a low-side at La Caixa and called it a day, leaving Lorenzo all alone up front. The battle for second place was in the end won by Pedrosa, while Stoner had to settle for the last step of the podium.

Fourth place belonged to De Puniet, while Suzuki’s Alvaro Bautista scored a personal best 5th place in the MotoGP. His veteran teammate Loris Capirossi almost made it to the finish line in 6th place, but was passed by Tech 3’s Ben Spies with a few laps to go. The Top 10 was completed by Nicky Hayden (8th place), Marco Melandri (who was recovering from his accident in Assen) and Ducati’s Hector Barbera.

With this win, Lorenzo now has 52 points of advantage over second placed Dani Pedrosa with only a race to go until the mid point of the 2010 campaign.