8 Sep 2009

Rossi wins in San Marino

6:41 am on 8 September 2009

The Italian motorcyclist Valentino Rossi has extended his lead in the MotoGP standings after easily beating Yamaha team-mate and championship rival Jorge Lorenzo to take the San Marino race.

The 30-year-old eight-times world champion - who had admitted this weekend to holding talks with Ferrari about driving for them in next weekend's Formula One Italian Grand Prix before deciding against taking up the offer - had been pinned back by Lorenzo when the Spaniard won last weekend's US MotoGp.

However, with victory his lead is 30 points - while another Spaniard Dani Pedrosa, who was third in San Marino, moves into third place overall on 157 points, seven ahead of Australian Casey Stoner, who is absent because of a mystery virus which has plagued him all season.

With 23 laps remaining Lorenzo was right on Rossi's tail with Pedrosa leading, but the irrepressible Italian gave himself some breathing space as he overtook Pedrosa two laps later.