Pedrosa leads delayed practice

Dani Pedrosa narrowly pipped Jorge Lorenzo to the fastest time in a delayed Saturday morning practice session at a murky Brno

Poor early weather conditions pushed all the practice sessions back by half an hour, although by the time MotoGP practice commenced the track was basically dry.

Honda rider Pedrosa went on to produce the best time of the weekend so far - a 1m57.201s - with his last lap of the session.

That allowed him to pip championship leader Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha) by 0.017 seconds. Andrea Dovizioso was third on the second works Honda, 0.3s off the pace and just ahead of Casey Stoner, who showed better form on the lead Ducati after a frustrating Friday.

The other three Yamahas were next up, factory rider Valentino Rossi head of the Tech 3 pair.

The session saw two crashes, with the already-injured Randy de Puniet limping away after falling from his LCR Honda. Suzuki's Alvaro Bautista also crashed at Turn 3, and had to be taken from the scene on a stretcher. He has since been taken to hospital for further checks.

Pos  Rider             Team               Time       Gap
 1.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda              1m57.201s
 2.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha             1m57.217s  + 0.016s
 3.  Andrea Dovizioso  Honda              1m57.572s  + 0.371s
 4.  Casey Stoner      Ducati             1m57.688s  + 0.487s
 5.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha             1m57.866s  + 0.665s
 6.  Colin Edwards     Tech 3 Yamaha      1m57.971s  + 0.770s
 7.  Ben Spies         Tech 3 Yamaha      1m57.975s  + 0.774s
 8.  Nicky Hayden      Ducati             1m58.166s  + 0.965s
 9.  Marco Simoncelli  Gresini Honda      1m58.507s  + 1.306s
10.  Héctor Barbera    Aspar Ducati       1m58.692s  + 1.491s
11.  Loris Capirossi   Suzuki             1m59.042s  + 1.841s
12.  Mika Kallio       Pramac Ducati      1m59.532s  + 2.331s
13.  Aleix Espargaro   Pramac Ducati      1m59.599s  + 2.398s
14.  Randy de Puniet   LCR Honda          1m59.775s  + 2.574s
15.  Marco Melandri    Gresini Honda      1m59.792s  + 2.591s
16.  Alvaro Bautista   Suzuki             2m00.158s  + 2.957s
17.  Alex de Angelis   Interwetten Honda  2m00.246s  + 3.045s