Stoner fastest again in second session

Casey Stoner remained on top in the second free practice session at Estoril, as Makoto Tamada took a surprise second place on the Dunlop Tech 3 Yamaha

Tamada emerged in second in the final quarter of the session, and although he was pushed down to third by Valentino Rossi soon afterwards, he then reclaimed the position with his last lap, ending up just 0.039 seconds behind Stoner.

Rossi remained third, ahead of Dani Pedroda, who had been fastest initially before Stoner hit the front.

Kawasaki's Randy de Puniet continued his strong Estoril form to take fifth, ahead of John Hopkins.

Having been outside the top ten in the opening session, Loris Capirossi improved to seventh for Ducati this afternoon.

Nicky Hayden, Alex Barros and Tamada's teammate Sylvain Guintoli filled the remaining top ten positions.

After his top ten performance earlier on, Carlos Checa dropped to 12th in second practice, and also had a minor fall.

The times were extraordinarily close, with the whole field bar Kurtis Roberts' troubled KR chassis lapping within 1.167 seconds, and just two tenths of a second covering sixth to 13th positions.

Pos  Rider             Make           Time
 1.  Casey Stoner      Ducati    (B)  1:37.950
 2.  Makoto Tamada     Yamaha    (D)  1:37.989  + 0.039
 3.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha    (M)  1:38.120  + 0.170
 4.  Daniel Pedrosa    Honda     (M)  1:38.201  + 0.251
 5.  Randy de Puniet   Kawasaki  (B)  1:38.287  + 0.337
 6.  John Hopkins      Suzuki    (B)  1:38.471  + 0.471
 7.  Loris Capirossi   Ducati    (B)  1:38.481  + 0.481
 8.  Nicky Hayden      Honda     (M)  1:38.518  + 0.568
 9.  Alex Barros       Ducati    (B)  1:38.613  + 0.663
10.  Sylvain Guintoli  Yamaha    (D)  1:38.630  + 0.680
11.  Chris Vermeulen   Suzuki    (B)  1:38.655  + 0.705
12.  Carlos Checa      Honda     (M)  1:38.669  + 0.719
13.  Anthony West      Kawasaki  (B)  1:38.723  + 0.773
14.  Shinya Nakano     Honda     (M)  1:38.761  + 0.811
15.  Toni Elias        Honda     (B)  1:38.843  + 0.893
16.  Marco Melandri    Honda     (B)  1:38.919  + 0.969
17.  Colin Edwards     Yamaha    (M)  1:39.050  + 1.100
18.  Alex Hofmann      Ducati    (B)  1:39.117  + 1.167
19.  Kurtis Roberts    KR        (M)  1:42.227  + 4.277