Stoner on top in wet second session

Unlike the morning's cold but dry session, the afternoon saw practice begin on an extremely wet track after heavy rain earlier on.

Most riders opted to get as much track time as possible in the expectation that the weather might remain changeable all weekend, and as the circuit dried, the pace came down from half a minute adrift of this morning's times to 12-13 seconds away.

Stoner's last lap of the afternoon, a 2m15.666s, took him to the top for Honda by 0.8s over Gresini's Marco Simoncelli, who was again in second place.

Few conclusions could be drawn from the times, with the track getting faster and faster as it dried, but third was still encouraging for Ducati's Nicky Hayden - and fourth for Cal Crutchlow (Tech 3 Yamaha) will have buoyed the British crowd.

The Yamahas of Jorge Lorenzo and Ben Spies were fifth and seventh, split by Honda's Andrea Dovizioso, while Valentino Rossi (Ducati) was ninth behind Cardion AB Ducati's Karel Abraham.

Pos  Rider             Team/Bike       Time       Gap
 1.  Casey Stoner      Honda           2m15.666s
 2.  Marco Simoncelli  Gresini Honda   2m16.463s  + 0.797s
 3.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati          2m17.070s  + 1.404s
 4.  Cal Crutchlow     Tech 3 Yamaha   2m18.109s  + 2.443s
 5.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha          2m18.683s  + 3.017s
 6.  Andrea Dovizioso  Honda           2m18.783s  + 3.117s
 7.  Ben Spies         Yamaha          2m18.820s  + 3.154s
 8.  Karel Abraham     Cardion Ducati  2m19.009s  + 3.343s
 9.  Valentino Rossi   Ducati          2m19.435s  + 3.769s
10.  Toni Elias        LCR Honda       2m19.612s  + 3.946s
11.  Alvaro Bautista   Suzuki          2m20.337s  + 4.671s
12.  Loris Capirossi   Pramac Ducati   2m20.607s  + 4.941s
13.  Hector Barbera    Aspar Ducati    2m20.639s  + 4.973s
14.  Randy de Puniet   Pramac Ducati   2m20.982s  + 5.316s
15.  Hiroshi Aoyama    Gresini Honda   2m21.026s  + 5.360s
16.  Colin Edwards     Tech 3 Yamaha   2m24.724s  + 9.058s