Yamaha's 2010 world champion Jorge Lorenzo took his first premier-class win at the Losail International Circuit to open the 2012 MotoGP season in the best possible way, after battling reigning World champion Casey Stoner and his Honda team mate Dani Pedrosa throughout the 22-lap race on Sunday evening.
It was also a superb start to the new 1000cc era in MotoGP, as the CRT machines also made their debut in an action-packed race.
Starting from pole for the first time since the US Grand Prix in July 2011, Lorenzo held the lead until Stoner powered past on the main straight on lap three. Lorenzo then tucked in behind Stoner for most of the race, never letting the Honda get more than two seconds ahead.
Then, with three laps to go, he took advantage as the Honda's tyres began to go off, and moved back into the lead.
After a difficult weekend that saw him qualify seventh Pedrosa rocketed from the third row of the grid into third place on lap one, where he stayed until lap 20, when he passed team mate Stoner with a superb move on the brakes going into Turn 1 to take second.
Lorenzo and Pedrosa battled in out over the final two laps, several times side by side, but the Yamaha held the advantage to win by less than a second, while Stoner, who had won in Qatar for four of the past five seasons, came home three seconds adrift for his 16th consecutive podium finish as he got his title defence underway.
Nobody else got a look in at the front but, 17 seconds further back, Yamaha Tech 3 team mates Cal Crutchlow and Andrea Dovizioso disputed fourth all the way. Dovizioso, in his first race on the M1, was in front with his British team mate all over his exhaust until lap 17, when Crutchlow got past Dovizioso and held on to equal his best previous MotoGP result, finishing just 0.306sec ahead.
Works rider Nicky Hayden was the highest Ducati placing, beating Alvaro Bautista's privateer Honda for sixth by just 0.033sec, while 2011 Moto2 World champion Stefan Bradl, also on a Honda, capped an impressive debut MotoGP ride with eighth.
Hector Barbera (Ducati) was in the hunt for sixth but ran off when he pushed too hard in the closing stages and finished ninth, just ahead of Ducati works team leader Valentino Rossi, who seemed to be struggling with his Desmosedici GP12 in the early stages of the race.
Yamaha works rider Ben Spies finished 11th, with Colin Edwards' BMW-powered Suter the highest-placed CRT machine in 12th, after holding off a strong challenge from Randy de Puniet on a Spanish-built ART machine.
MOTO2
Marc Marquez (Suter) beat Andrea Iannone (Speed Up) to the flag by just 0.061sec, as the intermediate class put on an absorbing 20-lap battle.
The two were part of a race-long battle for the lead that at one point involved seven riders, and came out of the last corner on the final lap side by side, with Marquez winning the sprint to the flag by half a wheel, with the rest of the leading pack only a second behind.
Kalex rider Pol Espargaro, who'd been part of the scrap for the win from the start and in fact led at one point, grabbed the last podium position by less than a quarter of a second after battling throughout the closing stages with team mate Esteve Rabat.
Thomas Luthi (Suter) started from pole and spent the entire race in the leading group, but his bid for glory ended at the start of the final lap when he challenged Marquez for the lead and was forced to run wide; he recovered to finish fifth, only three seconds off the pace.
Scott Redding (Kalex) finished strongly to take sixth from 13th on the grid, coming home just 0.026sec ahead of Mike di Meglio's Speed Up. Simone Corsi (FTR), who was also part of the battle for the lead in the early stages, came home eighth, with Bradley Smith (Tech 3) and Mika Kallio (Kalex) completing the top 10.
MOTO3
The debut of the new Moto3 category delivered a thrilling race as Maverick Vinales on a Honda-powered FTR took victory in the first race of the evening. Vinales, who won the final two 125cc races of the two-stroke era and was Rookie of the Year in 2011, was followed across the line by debutant Romano Fenati on a similar FTR, scoring a podium finish in his first Grand Prix.
Fenati led the race for the first six laps before Vinales got by and the pair traded places again before the more experienced Vinales - still only 17 and now the second-youngest rider in history to have won three consecutive Grands Prix - pulled away to win by 4.3 seconds.
Behind them an intense five-way battle developed for the final podium spot; in the end it was pole starter Sandro Cortese (KTM) who came home ahead of Luis Salom (Kalex KTM), Miguel Oliveira (Suter Honda), Malaysian rider Zulfahmi Khairuddin (KTM) and rookie Arthur Sissis (KTM).
Any of the five could have taken third until Cortese got the drive out of the last corner on the final lap to beat Salom, with all five crossing the line in less than 1.5 seconds.
The next MotoGP will be on 29 April at Jerez in Spain.
RESULTS - MOTOGP
1 Jorge Lorenzo (Spain) Yamaha - 42min44.214
2 Dani Pedrosa (Spain) Honda +0.852sec
3 Casey Stoner (Australia) Honda +2.908
4 Cal Crutchlow (Britain) Yamaha +17.114
5 Andrea Dovizioso (Italy) Yamaha +17.420
6 Nicky Hayden (US) Ducati +28.413
7 Alvaro Bautista (Spain) Honda +28.446
8 Stefan Bradl (Germany) Honda +29.464
9 Hector Barbera (Spain) Ducati +31.384
10 Valentino Rossi (Italy) Ducati +33.665
MOTO2
1 Marc Marquez (Spain) Suter - 40min34.225
2 Andrea Iannone (Italy) Speed Up +0.061sec
3 Pol Espargaro (Spain) Kalex +1.412
4 Esteve Rabat (Spain) Kalex +1.639
5 Thomas Luthi (Switzerland) Suter +3.981
6 Scott Redding (Britain) Kalex +6.768
7 Mike di Meglio (France) Speed Up +6.794
8 Simone Corsi (Italy) FTR +6.986
9 Bradley Smith (Britain) Tech 3 +10.828
10 Mika Kallio (Finland) Kalex +11.379
MOTO3
1 Maverick Vinales (Spain) FTR Honda - 38min40.995
2 Romano Fenati (Italy) FTR Honda +4.301sec
3 Sandro Cortese (Germany) KTM +18.013
4 Luis Salom (Spain) Kalex KTM +18.200
5 Miguel Oliveira (Portugal) Suter Honda +18.745
6 Zulfahmi Khairuddin (Malaysia) KTM +19.052
7 Arthur Sissis (Australia) KTM +19.466
8 Danny Kent (Britain) KTM +21.098
9 Louis Rossi (France) FTR Honda +21.153
10 Alex Rins (Spain) Suter Honda +28.733