Stoner: Rossi was unbeatable today

The MotoGP championship leader pulled out a comfortable lead in the early part of the race, but was later reeled in and passed by his title rival.

"I just don't think we could have gone a lot better with the bike, the tyres and the set-up we had," Stoner told Eurosport.

"We did the best job we could and I think Valentino just had a lot more pace. I tried to stay with him for the last couple of laps and the mid-turn speed he had on me was just phenomenal, so I'm really happy with this result.

"I saw him catching me and catching me. I was just trying to keep things constant and stay smooth, and when he got there I started to feel a little bit better grip so I tried to go a little bit harder, but that was as much as I could do on the bike today.

"We've really got to be happy with what we've done because I think Valentino, with the way he caught us, had a lot more pace, so to come out with a result like this today is really good."

Stoner believes the strong wind at Assen was a factor in his defeat.

"Unfortunately it was really windy today and with the Ducati's big fairings I was sort of getting blown wide on a lot of corners and I was losing the front," he told the BBC.

"I started to feel the front getting too much tyre wear on it, so I was trying to sit back on the rear a little bit and try to use the rear tyre, but we were still sliding around with that, so I don't think I could've gone a lot quicker, especially at the end of the race."