Sachsenring MotoGP: Valentino Rossi snatches series lead with second

Valentino Rossi moved back into the lead in the MotoGP world championship after he claimed a hard fought second in a rain-lashed Sachsenring clash.

Starting from seventh on the grid, Rossi needed until the eighth lap to move into the top three. He passed Andrea Dovizioso to claim second on lap nine, but he was powerless to put runaway leader Casey Stoner under any severe pressure as he had to settle for a distant second.

“I’m really happy with this result, even if racing in the rain today wasn’t quite as much fun as I’ve had in some of my past races here! For the championship this is very, very important; I made a mistake last week in Assen and today Dani did the same. It’s unlucky but this is racing and now we are back in front and this is a very good feeling. Dani is tough and we know he will be back fighting at the front, but sincerely at the moment we need to think about how to catch Casey because he has been very fast now for a few races. Once again here we lost some time during the practice trying to find the right setting and we can’t afford to keep doing this. Today we started from the third row and this meant that I had to deal with some confusion at the start and lost some time on the front riders. By the ti me I got behind Casey my M1 was working very well and I had very good grip with my Bridgestone rain tyres; I felt very confident and I tried hard to push but there was no way to catch him at that stage, so our aim must be to start at the front from now on. Thanks to all my team and engineers; now we have to try to extend this lead in Laguna.”