VALENCIA — World MotoGP champion Jorge Lorenzo was denied a victorious season finale on home soil when he crashed out while leading an incident-packed Valencia Grand Prix Sunday to hand victory to fellow-Spaniard Dani Pedrosa. Yamaha rider Lorenzo, who clinched his second world title two weeks ago at Phillip Island off Australia, lost control of his machine with around 17 laps remaining and catapulted off the track to leave Honda's Pedrosa with a comfortable lead over Briton Cal Crutchlow in third. Lorenzo was able to walk away from the accident and did not appear to have sustained any injuries. Crutchlow crashed with seven laps left and Pedrosa cruised to his seventh win of the year, one more than Lorenzo, almost 40 seconds ahead of Japanese Yamaha pilot Katsuyuki Nakasuga, standing in for injured American Ben Spies, in second. Pedrosa's Honda teammate Casey Stoner, in the Australian double world champion's final race before retiring, pipped Yamaha's Alvaro Bautista to third a further 23 seconds back. The Honda mechanics paid tribute to Stoner as he crossed the line and hung out a sign reading “Going fishing” for the 27-year-old, a possible hint of how he may fill some of his time after falling out of love with the sport. Stoner told Spanish television he had ridden a careful race as he was worried about hurting the foot he damaged in Indianapolis in August. In the Moto2 category, champion Marc Marquez, who will replace Stoner at Honda next season, charged from last on the grid to win ahead of Spanish compatriots Julian Simon and Nico Terol. Briton Danny Kent took victory in Moto3 ahead of Italian champion Sandro Cortese and Zulfahmi Khairuddin of Malaysia. — Reuters
