Casey Stoner of Australia extended his overall world championship lead after storming to his fifth victory of the season at the British MotoGP here on Sunday. The Ducati rider dominated on a damp circuit at Donington Park to finish 11.768sec ahead of American Colin Edwards, who had started from pole position on his Yamaha.
A late manoeuvre by Australian Chris Vermeulen of Suzuki gave him third position at the expense of Italian Valentino Rossi.
"I can't believe it after such a bad start, we managed to come through pretty good," said Stoner, who had got off to a poor start from fifth on the grid. "We didn't know what to expect. It was either going to bucket down or dry out, so we took a bit of a gamble on tyres.
"We went with a soft option because the track doesn't damage tyres too much and then once I got into the lead I tried just to smooth it out while it dried, and it worked."
Stoner added to his wins in Qatar, Turkey, China and Catalunya two weeks ago to extend his lead on Rossi in the world standings to 26 points after the Yamaha rider crossed in fourth position. Last year's winner Dani Pedrosa of Honda finished eighth despite leading for the first four laps.
The Spaniard suffered problems with the grip on the tyres allowing Edwards to take over the lead which he held until mid-race before he took a bend too wide and was overtaken by Stoner.
World champion Nicky Hayden of the United States finished last after crashing his Repsol Honda on lap three before remounting, with Spaniard Carlos Checa being forced to retire.
Earlier Italian Honda rider Andrea Dovizioso scorched to victory under the rain in the 250cc category ahead of San Marino's Alex De Angelis and Hiroshi Aoyama of Japan.
Italian Mattia Pasini, on an Aprilia, won the 125cc race ahead of Japan's Tomoyoshi Koyama and championship leader Hector Faubel of Spain.