Rossi earns 100th career victory

Valentino Rossi romped to his 100th career victory as he won the Dutch MotoGP at Assen to go clear in the MotoGP world championship standings.

The reigning world champion came home ahead of Fiat Yamaha team-mate Jorge Lorenzo, with Australia's Casey Stoner, who led early on, finishing third.

Honda duo Dani Pedrosa and Andrea Dovizioso crashed out from threatening positions on the same corner.

Their exits helped James Toseland to sixth, his best result of the season.

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" Even though I'm a Casey fan, this is a big achievement for a rider to win 100 races. Rossi is an all-time great and no one will ever achieve as much as he has done in MotoGP "

"I'm so happy, it was a great race," Rossi told BBC Sport.

"I felt good from the first lap, so I decided to push to the maximum.

"I know Jorge Lorenzo is hard to beat but I have great pace, the tyres worked very well and Yamaha is fantastic on this track."

His victory was a lot more straight forward than his dramatic win over Lorenzo in Barcelona, and he joked "this was more boring from the outside, but another battle with Jorge like that is too much for old people like my grandmother."

Stoner's third place finish was all the more impressive considering he was suffering from stomach cramps for the second consecutive race, and after the race he was clearly in pain.

"It's not my fitness, I know I've trained hard enough, it's something a bit strange", said the Australian.

"Luckily the bike was working well on a bad day."

Once Rossi got past Stoner there was no great battle for the podium places, with the main area of excitement being the battle for sixth place.

Toseland was at the front of the pack for a lot of the time, holding off the attentions of Mika Kallio, but going into the closing stages, it seemed his chance of sixth place was gone.

But Toni Elias and Loris Capirossi went on to the grass at the final corner, opening the door for Toseland to go through, and Kallio skidded off into the gravel and failed to finish.

"I was getting ready to pass Mika at the last corner when Elias came under me at Turn 10. That let Loris through too and I'd gone from sixth to ninth!," said Toseland.

"It was so chaotic I didn't even see Kallio crash and I thought when Elias dived under Loris at the last chicane that they might run off. Fortunately for me they did and I took advantage - leading that group for so long, I think I deserved sixth."

Earlier, in the 125cc race, Spain's Sergio Gadea claimed his first win of the season as he came home ahead of Nico Terol and Julian Simon, with Bradley Smith fourth.

But Smith was promoted to a podium position after Terol was penalised 20 seconds for a clash with Gadea.

That result ensures Smith remains in close contention in the 125cc championship standings.

Smith's compatriots Scott Redding and Danny Webb failed to make up ground in the championship as they both failed to finish. Redding suffered mechanical problems and Webb crashed out.

And Hiroshi Aoyama took the lead in the 250cc standings after winning his race, ahead of Hector Barbera and Marco Simoncelli.

Previous championship leader Alvaro Bautista failed to finish after hitting the back of Aoyama's bike.

Dutch MotoGP race result:
1 V Rossi (Ita) Yamaha 42 minutes 14.611 seconds
2 J Lorenzo (Spa) Yamaha 42:19.979
3 C Stoner (Aus) Ducati 42:37.724
4 C Edwards (USA) Yamaha 42:43.725
5 C Vermeulen (Aus) Suzuki 42:48.216
6 J Toseland (Gbr) Yamaha 42:53.958
7 R De Puniet (Fra) Honda 42:54.154
8 T Elias (Spa) Honda 42:54.385
9 N Hayden (USA) Ducati 42:54.434
10 L Capirossi (Ita) Suzuki 42:55.284
11 A de Angelis (RSM) Honda 43:00.621
12 M Melandri (Ita) Kawasaki 43:12.388
13 S Gibernau (Spn) Ducati 43:19.977
14 N Canepa (Ita) Ducati 43:24.508
15 Y Takahashi (Jpn) Honda 43:24.541

MotoGP world championship standings:

1 V Rossi (Ita) 131 points
2 J Lorenzo (Spn) 126
3 C Stoner (Aus) 122
4 A Dovizioso (Ita) 69
5 D Pedrosa (Spn) 67
= C Edwards (USA) 67
7 L Capirossi (Ita) 55
8 M Melandri (Ita) 54
9 C Vermeulen (Aus) 53
10 R de Puniet (Fr) 51

125cc race result:

1 S Gadea (Sp) Aprilia 39 minutes 07.577 seconds
2 J Simon (Sp) Aprilia 39:08.478
3 B Smith (GB) Aprilia 39:19.933

125cc championship standings:

1 J Simon (Spn) Aprilia 104 points
2 B Smith (GB) Aprilia 98.5
3 A Iannone (Ita) Aprilia 84.5

250cc race result:

1 H Aoyama (Jpn) Honda 40 minutes 44.008 seconds
2 H Barbera (Spn) Aprilia 40:48.432
3 M Simoncelli (Ita) Gilera 40:54.437

250cc championship standings:

1 H Aoyama (Jpn) Honda 121 points
2 A Bautista (Spn) Aprilia) 108
3 H Barbera (Spn) Aprilia 95

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