Yamaha's newest factory rider, American Ben Spies, claimed his first MotoGP victory in difficult conditions at an unpredictable Van Drenthe circuit in Assen, in a scrappy race where two leading riders crashed, rejoined - and still finished in the top 10!

The works Hondas of championship leader Casey Stoner and Andrea Dovizioso came home second and third respectively.

Spies, who was edged out of pole position on Friday by Honda privateer Marco Simoncelli, rode a perfect race to cross the line 7.697sec ahead of Stoner.

The Texan had a good start, allowing him to narrowly avoid the drama of the first lap, when pole starter Simoncelli took out Spies' team mate, reigning World champion Jorge Lorenzo, in the third corner.

Stoner lead team mate Andrea Dovizioso to the finish, where Italian claimed his third top-three finish of the 2011 season. Stoner is now 28 points ahead of Lorenzo in the championship while Dovizioso remains third, but is now only nine points behind Lorenzo.

Ducati works riders Valentino Rossi and Nicky Hayden finished fourth and fifth Lorenzo was able to rejoin the race, moving up to seventh on lap 13 and passing Yamaha Tech 3 rider Colin Edwards - still in pain from torn intercostal muscles - for sixth, five laps from the end.

Former works Honda 250GP rider Hiroshi Aoyama, standing in for the injured Danio Pedrosa, rode a steady race to finish eighth, 1.29sec ahead of Simoncelli, who'd managed to push-start his Honda (very, very difficult with a high-compression MotoGP machine) and rejoin the race.

He put in a late charge, but battled for three laps to get past Toni Elias (also on a Honda) and couldn't catch Aoyama before the flag.

Edwards' team mate Cal Crutchlow pitted for a new rear tyre, but rejoined the race two laps down to finish 14th and last.

MOTO2

Reigning 125cc champion Marc Marquez (Suter) took his second Moto2 win in tricky conditions in a race that started wet and ended dry, climbing six places in the Moto2 Championship to second in the standings. The 18-year-old finished 2.4sec ahead of former World Supersport champion Kenan Sofuoglu (Suter), who scored his first podium of the season, and Tech 3's Bradley Smith.

Sofuoglu and Smith battled for the lead throughout the race with Marquez, Yuki Takahashi (Moriwaki) and Mike di Meglio (Tech 3) an early front runner until he crashed out on lap three. Takahashi made it up to second before he went down with only four laps to go.

Anthony West (MZ) rode a strong race to come home a distant fourth, his best finish of the season so far, chased by Alex de Angelis (Motobi) and Mattia Pasini (FTR), who was happy to finish in the top 10 after crashing out of the previous round at Silverstone.

Everybody has started on wets but as the circuit dried the rain tyres began to shred. There were a number of fallers in the closing stages, including championship leader Stefan Bradl (Kalex) who went down in the chicane while lying fourth with three laps to go - putting a big dent in his points lead.

It was also not a good day for the Gresini team, as Michele Pirro followed his team mate Takahashi and crashed on the last lap. Jules Cluzel crashed twice - he went down on the warm-up lap, made it to the start but dumped his Suter again on lap three

125

Teenage rookie Maverick Viñales, riding an Aprilia sponsored by Paris Hilton, charged to his second victory of 2011, pulling a 2.5 second gap from the battle for second before heavy rain brought out the red flags.

The start - with 35 bikes on the grid - was the usual 125cc traffic jam, with eight bikes jostling for the early lead. Vinales' team mate Sergio Gadea led the charge into the first corner; he rode an aggressive race, making some astonishing passes through the chicane and trading places several times with the Derbis of Johann Zarco and Efren Vazquez.

Vinales got a dreadful start and was down in ninth at one point, but soon got into his rhythm and began slicing through the field, finally making an outside pass on Sandro Cortese (Aprilia) to take the lead on lap 10.

He soon pulled a two-second gap on the battle for second between Cortese, Salom and Gadea; Salom pulled a very gutsy pass on Gadea just as the rain started on lap 14, just in time to be classified second when the drizzle turn into a downpour on lap 15 and the red flags came out.

Since two thirds of the race distance had been completed, there was no restart; positions (and full points) were awarded as at the end of lap 14.

Cortese finished fourth, followed by Zarco, Danny Kent (Aprilia) and Vazquez in seventh. Kent's team mate Jonas Folger was in the lead pack until he had a big moment in turn one and dropped back to finish eighth, ahead of Marcel Schrötter (Mahindra) in ninth and Aprilia's Hector Faubel.

Local rider Jasper Iwema (Aprilia) started from 32nd and moved up to 17th before he and Kent's team mate Adrian Martin went down on lap seven. British rookie Harry Stafford (Aprilia) crashed on lap nine but was able to rejoin the race and was running 25th when the race was stopped.

RESULTS – MOTOGP:

1 Ben Spies (US) Yamaha - 41min44.659

2 Casey Stoner (Australia) Honda +7.697sec

3 Andrea Dovizioso (Italy) Honda +27.506

4 Valentino Rossi (Italy) Ducati +30.684

5 Nicky Hayden (US) Ducati +43.172

6 Jorge Lorenzo (Spain) Yamaha +44.536

7 Colin Edwards (US) Yamaha +1min08.112

8 Hiroshi Aoyama (Japan) Honda +1min10.753

9 Marco Simoncelli (Italy) Honda +1min24.925 10 Toni Elias (Spain) Honda +1min26.216

11 Alvaro Bautista (Spain) Suzuki 1min38.466

12 Hector Barbera (Spain) Ducati +1 lap

13 Kousuke Akiyoshi (Japan) +1 lap

14 Cal Crutchlow (Britain) Yamaha +2 laps POINTS AFTER SEVEN ROUNDS

1 Casey Stoner (Australia) Honda - 136 points

2 Jorge Lorenzo (Spain) Yamaha - 108

3 Andrea Dovizioso (Italy) Honda - 99

4 Valentino Rossi (Italy) Ducati - 81

5 Nicky Hayden (US) Ducati - 71

6 Dani Pedrosa (Spain) Honda - 61

7 Ben Spies (US) Yamaha - 61

8 Hiroshi Aoyama (Japan) Honda - 51

9 Colin Edwards (US) Yamaha - 46

10 Marco Simoncelli (Italy) Honda - 39

MOTO2

1 Marc Marquez (Spain) Suter - 44min30.409

2 Kenan Sofuoglu (Turkey) Suter +2.397sec

3 Bradley Smith (Britain) Tech 3 +6.418

4 Anthony West (Australia) MZ +22.803

5 Alex de Angelis (San Marino) Motobi + 25.882

6 Mattia Pasini (Italy) FTR +26.851

7 Esteve Rabat (Spain) FTR +28.125

8 Thomas Luthi (Switzerland) Suter +28.712

9 Randy Krummenacher (Switzerland) +29.744 10 Max Neukirchner (Germany) MZ +39.767

125

1 Maverick Vinales (Spain) Aprilia – 25min04.147

2 Luis Salom (Spain) Aprilia +2.555sec

3 Sergio Gadea (Spain) Aprilia +2.655

4 Sandro Cortese (Germany) Aprilia +3.670

5 Johann Zarco (France) Derbi +3.903

6 Danny Kent (Britain) Aprilia +4.469

7 Efren Vasquez (Spain) Derbi +8.828

8 Jonas Folger (Germany) Aprilia +10.416

9 Marcel Schrotter (Germany) Mahindra +10.791 10 Hector Faubel (Spain) Aprilia +13.238