Home win like a movie - Lorenzo

The Yamaha rider had dropped to fifth at the start, but hunted down and passed everyone ahead, eventually get ahead of Pedrosa half a lap from the finish.

Although Lorenzo was twice a winner at Jerez in 250cc, none of his previous MotoGP wins had come in Spain.

"It has always been one of my dreams to win a MotoGP race in Spain and this was like a movie, everything that could possibly happen did," he said.

"It was a very hard race because I made such a bad start and then found it very difficult in the first laps - I gave myself a tough job to do. After that I started to feel better and rode like a demon to get to the front."

It looked like third might be Lorenzo's limit in the middle of the race, before he started gaining on leaders Pedrosa and Valentino Rossi, passing his team-mate with six laps to go.

"Once I passed Valentino I knew that I couldn't take it easy, I had to try everything to win and it was all I could think about," said Lorenzo.

"I had a great fight with Dani and in one moment we nearly crashed so I had to try again, on the very last lap! I know it's better to win races calmly, from the front, but lately that hasn't been the way for us and I have had to fight on every lap."

Having clinched victory, Lorenzo celebrated by leaping into the lake at the middle of the circuit during his slowing-down lap, before riding back to the pits once he had completed his impromptu swim.

"I saw the lake on Thursday and thought it would be funny to jump in and I think the fans liked it, but I didn't really think about how heavy I'd be with wet leathers and for a minute I thought I wasn't going to get out!" Lorenzo confessed.

"This has been an amazing day, I can't believe I've achieved this dream of mine, in front of all the Spanish fans at this magical place."