Sachsenring specialist Dani Pedrosa won his third successive German MotoGP to open his account for the year yesterday.

While the Spaniard took the honours, his Honda team-mate Casey Stoner, destined to take second, crashed out with two bends of the final lap remaining to dent his hopes of defending his world title before he heads into retirement.

The main beneficiary of Stoner’s spill yesterday was Yamaha’s former champion Jorge Lorenzo who was gifted the runner-up spot to move clear at the top of the riders standings on 160 points.

Pedrosa climbed into second on 146 points with Stoner, pointless in Sachsenring, on 140.

First corner carnage in Assen the week before had checked Lorenzo’s title charge with Stoner arriving at this race level on points with the Spaniard.

Alvaro Bautista was found guilty for that spill and as a punishment the Honda rider was consigned to the back of the grid.

In contrast to Saturday’s wet weather qualifying session, a dry track greeted the grid headed by Stoner on pole position but the Australian was beaten to the first corner by Pedrosa, who started in third.

Stoner, though, reclaimed the lead from his team-mate on turn nine of the opening lap, with Yamaha duo Ben Spies and Lorenzo racing in third and fourth places.

The Hondas quickly opened up acres of daylight around the sinuous track, with a near three-second gap between Pedrosa and Spies by lap six.

With ten laps gone Lorenzo was up to third as in front Pedrosa stalked Stoner.

The Spaniard duly pounced and passed his Honda colleague with a dozen laps still to go for the end of the race, but was unable to pull clear, setting up a thrilling last third of the race with Lorenzo out of the picture, eight seconds adrift.

Stoner was all set to take second and add another valuable 20 points to his push for the championship until his front wheel went from under him on the last lap, the Australian sliding off, thankfully ending up unharmed in the gravel.

Pedrosa said: “At the start I was not comfortable because of changes to my bike. As I became used to all the changes I passed Casey, and was feeling good.

“Towards the end I had to fight for the win, on the last lap I was racing at my maximum.”

Result

1. Pedrosa (Honda), 2. Lorenzo (Yamaha) at 14.996 seconds, 3. Dovizioso (Yamaha) 20.669, 4. Spies (Yamaha) 20.740, 5. Bradl (Honda) 27.893, 6. Rossi (Honda) 28.050, 7. Bautista (Honda) 28.246, 8. Crutchlow (Yamaha) 28.447, 9. Barbera (Ducati) 29.053, 10. Hayden (Ducati) 29.226.

Standings

1. Lorenzo 160 points; 2. Pedrosa 146; 3. Stoner 140; 4. Dovizioso 92; 5. Crutchlow 85; 6. Rossi 71; 7. Bautista 67; 8. Hayden 65; 9. Bradl 62; 10. Spies 61.