Casey Stoner tops wet final Brno practice, despite crashing early on
Casey Stoner bounced back from an early crash to set the pace in a wet final practice session for the Czech Grand Prix at Brno
The Australian had not even completed a flying lap when he dropped the front end of his Honda under braking for Turn 3 only five minutes into the session.
While the bike went end-over-end at high speed into the gravel trap, the Australian was unhurt, and despite only completing limited laps during the opening half hour, his best lap of 2m07.321s with eight minutes left was enough to put him top of the timesheets.
The man he knocked off the top - by 0.3s - was his world championship rival Jorge Lorenzo. The Yamaha rider did improve his time towards the end though and wound up only 0.005s shy of Stoner.
Valentino Rossi and Nicky Hayden were third and fifth for Ducati, the pair split by Friday pace-setter Dani Pedrosa's Honda.
Hiroshi Aoyama and Cal Crutchlow were impressive in sixth and seventh places for the Gresini Honda and Tech-3 Yamaha squads respectively, while Andrea Dovizioso (Honda), Marco Simoncelli (Gresini) and Ben Spies (Yamaha) completed the top 10.
Like Stoner, John Hopkins crashed at Turn 3, but the Suzuki rider returned to his garage complaining of pains in his hand. He was taken to the Clinica Mobile with a suspected broken finger that could put him out of action for the rest of the weekend.
Pos Rider Team Time Laps 1. Casey Stoner Honda 2m07.321s 13 2. Jorge Lorenzo Yamaha 2m07.326s + 0.005 16 3. Valentino Rossi Ducati 2m07.443s + 0.122 16 4. Dani Pedrosa Honda 2m07.652s + 0.331 18 5. Nicky Hayden Ducati 2m07.695s + 0.374 17 6. Hiroshi Aoyama Gresini Honda 2m07.743s + 0.422 18 7. Cal Crutchlow Tech 3 Yamaha 2m07.806s + 0.485 15 8. Andrea Dovizioso Honda 2m07.877s + 0.556 17 9. Marco Simoncelli Gresini Honda 2m07.944s + 0.623 16 10. Ben Spies Yamaha 2m08.089s + 0.768 17 11. Karel Abraham Cardion AB Ducati 2m08.460s + 1.139 18 12. Colin Edwards Tech 3 Yamaha 2m08.516s + 1.195 17 13. Alvaro Bautista Suzuki 2m08.644s + 1.323 17 14. Loris Capirossi Pramac Ducati 2m08.881s + 1.560 17 15. Toni Elias LCR Honda 2m08.936s + 1.615 17 16. Randy de Puniet Pramac Ducati 2m08.985s + 1.664 18 17. Hector Barbera Aspar Ducati 2m10.046s + 2.725 16 18. John Hopkins Suzuki 2m13.479s + 6.158 5
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