Honda's Casey Stoner races to French MotoGP win

Stoner wins as Pedrosa crashes

Casey Stoner won an incident-packed French MotoGP as his Repsol Honda team-mate Dani Pedrosa crashed out, breaking his right collarbone in the process.

As Stoner pulled away from the pack, Spain's Pedrosa was involved in an enthralling battle for second with Marco Simoncelli.

Pedrosa's race ended when he clipped the Italian's back wheel and slid out.

Simoncelli's ride-through penalty let in team-mate Andrea Dovizioso to claim second, with Valentino Rossi third.

World champion Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) came home fourth, enough to retain top place in the championship on 78 points, with Stoner moving up a place into second on 66 points.

Casey Stoner wins in Le Mans

Stoner, who showed some impressive pace over the closing laps to win by more than 14 seconds for his second victory of the season, said: "This weekend has been fantastic for us. It happens very rarely when a weekend goes so smoothly.

"It was a pretty tough race for the first third of it then it smoothed out."

Pedrosa had surgery only last month to remove a metal plate from his left collarbone before winning the Portuguese Grand Prix.

He now faces a race to prove his fitness in time for his home race in Barcelona on 5 June , the fifth round of the 18-race season."

Stoner happy with Honda

"I was having a good race, the goal was to ensure another podium and I had it in my grasp. But it counts for nothing," said Pedrosa.

"Simoncelli overtook me, I passed him back and I had the better line, he just came into me releasing the brakes and I could do nothing. I leave here with a broken collarbone and he with a ride through penalty, good for him!

"Yet again I come out worse off. We only just recovered from the nightmare of the last operation and now I'm hurt again. It is very unfair, I don't deserve it".

Lorenzo generally struggled to get the best out of his Yamaha while Simoncelli, after serving his penalty, finished fifth.

Conditions were dry but there were other spills apart from Pedrosa's with Loris Capirossi, Britain's Cal Crutchlow and Randy de Puniet all coming off the track.

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MotoGP result:

1 C Stoner (Aus) Honda 44 mins 03.955 secs
2 A Dovizioso (Ita) Honda 44:18.169
3 V Rossi (Ita) Ducati 44:18.519
4 J Lorenzo (Spn) Yamaha 44:25.030
5 M Simoncelli (Ita) Honda 44:35.200
6 B Spies (US) Yamaha 44:35.564
7 N Hayden (US) Ducati 44:39.521
8 H Aoyama (Jpn) Honda 44:55.457
9 H Barbera (Spn) Ducati 45:07.686
10 K Abraham (Cze) Ducati 45:07.840
11 T Elias (Spn) Honda 45:08.023
12 A Bautista (Spn) Suzuki 45:08.147
13 C Edwards (US) Yamaha 26 Laps
DNF L Capirossi (Ita) Ducati 21 Laps
DNF D Pedrosa (Spn) Honda 17 Laps

Standings:

1 J Lorenzo 78
2 C Stoner 66
3 D Pedrosa 61
4 A Dovizioso 50
5 V Rossi 47
6 N Hayden 39
7 H Aoyama 36
8 M Simoncelli 22
9 C Edwards 21
10 H Barbera 21
11 C Crutchlow 21
12 B Spies 20
13 K Abraham 18
14 T Elias 17
15 L Capirossi 9

Moto2 result:

1 M Marquez (Spn) Suter 43min 03.308sec
2 Y Takahashi (Jpn) Moriwaki 43:05.290
3 S Bradl (Ger) Kalex 43:05.545

Other:

9 B Smith (GB) Tech 3 43:23.716

Standings:

1 S Bradl 77
2 J Simon 49
3 A Iannone 48

Other:

8 B Smith 27

125cc result:

1 M Vinales (Spn) Aprilia 42 min 00.505 secs
2 N Terol (Spn) Aprilia 42:00.553
3 E Vazquez (Spn) Derbi 42:07.341

Standings:

1 Nicolas Terol 95
2 Sandro Cortese 59
3 Johann Zarco 53

Other:

11 D Kent (GB) 17