Casey Stoner picked up his seventh win of the season at Brno. The Malbor Ducati rider now holds a commanding 60-point lead over Valentino Rossi in the title chase.
is starting to look like
Valentino Rossi did during his meteoric rise to the
MotoGP championship. Stoner has a lot of ground to make up in order to stand at Valentino's level of racing stature, but he is beginning to look like a doctor in his own right. The Marlboro Ducati rider is surgically dissecting the MotoGP field week after week, and he just collected his seventh win of the season at Brno.
The 7.9-second victory over Rizla Suzuki's John Hopkins and Repsol Honda's Nicky Hayden now places the Duc pilot 60 points ahead of second place in the championship. After starting on pole for the third consecutive race, Stoner raced away from the pack. The runner-up position by Hopkins was the American's best result to date, and moved him into a points tie with his Australian teammate, Chris Vermeulen, at 124 apiece. The other American to make the podium was the reigning champ, Hayden. Nicky was off the lead pace, but a strong runner-up performance yesterday in qualifying put him in excellent position to spend time up front and net his third podium in four races.
Hayden's miniscule teammate, Dani Pedrosa, nailed down fourth nearly three seconds behind the Kentucky Kid. Pedrosa currently sits in third for the championship behind Rossi. The Czech Grand Prix wasn't as good to the Doctor as his team and legions of fans were hoping for. He finished a distant seventh place and is steadily losing ground to Stoner with only six races to go. It's an uphill battle for the Fiat Yamaha star.
MotoGP Brno Results:
1. Casey Stoner (Ducati)
2. John Hopkins (Suzuki)
3. Nicky Hayden (Honda)
4. Dani Pedrosa (Honda)
5. Chris Vermeulen (Suzuki)
6. Loris Capirossi (Ducati)
7. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha)
8. Randy de Puniet (Kawasaki)
9. Alex Barros (Ducati)
10. Carlos Checa (Honda)
MotoGP Overall Standings:
1. Stoner, 246
2. Rossi, 186
3. Pedrosa, 168
4. Vermeulen, 124
5. Hopkins, 124
