Casey Stoner defeats Jorge Lorenzo in Laguna Seca MotoGP race

Honda pair Stoner and Dani Pedrosa and current championship leader Lorenzo were in a class of their own all race, storming away from the rest of the pack from the outset.

Stoner soon took second from Pedrosa, then piled pressure onto polesitter Lorenzo.

For a short while mid-race, Lorenzo managed to get a little breathing space, but Stoner was soon back on his tail, and with 10 laps to go the Honda swept ahead on the run towards Turn 1.

Thereafter Stoner was able to edge into a slight lead that he retained to the finish, claiming his fourth win of the year.

Pedrosa fell away a little in third, which keeps him second in the championship.

Hobbling on a heel injury after his qualifying accident, Ben Spies could not match the top three but was fending off the Tech 3 Yamahas for fourth until crashing on the way down the Corkscrew when his Yamaha's swingarm broke.

That elevated Andrea Dovizioso and Cal Crutchlow's battle to a fight for fourth, with Dovizioso just hanging on.

Nicky Hayden beat Stefan Bradl to sixth after a long dice. Hayden's Ducati team-mate Valentino Rossi had been running a very lonely eighth until he crashed heavily - without injury - on the way over the Corkscrew crest just two laps from home.

Aleix Espargaro was top CRT finisher in ninth overall. His Aspar team-mate Randy de Puniet fought back well to recover from last to 11th after running wide in an incident with Michele Pirro and returnee Toni Elias at the first corner. Pirro fell and retired, while Elias continued only to crash out of his MotoGP comeback race on lap two.

Attack Performance's wildcard CRT entry was not given clearance to start after failing to lap within the 107 per cent cut-off in either qualifying or the warm-up. The American team and rider Steve Rapp will try again in the next round at Indianapolis in three weeks' time.

Results - 32 laps:

Pos  Rider             Team/Bike                    Time/Gap
 1.  Casey Stoner      Honda                      43m45.961s
 2.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha                       + 3.429s
 3.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda                        + 7.633s
 4.  Andrea Dovizioso  Tech 3 Yamaha               + 18.602s
 5.  Cal Crutchlow     Tech 3 Yamaha               + 18.779s
 6.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati                      + 26.902s
 7.  Stefan Bradl      LCR Honda                   + 28.393s
 8.  Alvaro Bautista   Gresini Honda               + 50.246s
 9.  Aleix Espargaro   Aspar Aprilia             + 1m18.993s
10.  Karel Abraham     Cardion Ducati            + 1m22.076s
11.  Randy de Puniet   Aspar Aprilia                 + 1 lap
12.  Yonny Hernandez   Avintia FTR-Kawasaki          + 1 lap
13.  Colin Edwards     Forward Suter-BMW             + 1 lap
14.  Ivan Silva        Avintia Inmotec-Kawasaki      + 1 lap

Retirements:

     Valentino Rossi   Ducati                        29 laps
     Ben Spies         Yamaha                        21 laps
     James Ellison     Paul Bird Aprilia             19 laps
     Danilo Petrucci   Ioda-Aprilia                  18 laps
     Mattia Pasini     Speed Master Aprilia          11 laps
     Toni Elias        Pramac Ducati                   1 lap
     Michele Pirro     Gresini FTR-Honda              0 laps