Estoril, on Portugal's Atlantic coast, is one of the great circuits. It's old enough to still have some vestiges of character while being new enough to be reasonably safe. It's fast and flowing in places, while others are tight and technical. It's a circuit which rewards a delicate right hand and a skilled suspension technician in favour of enormous power. Though obviously any MotoGP bike is blessed with enormous power anyway - the knack at a circuit like this is getting that power to launch you forwards rather than sideways. Or, worse still, upwards.

Of course, going to a circuit on the Atlantic coast in mid April is always going to be a bit of a gamble, weatherwise. And so it was this time as rain squalls and wind did their best to mess up free practice. They were quite successful, too. But MotoGP riders are hardy characters. Well, mainly, anyway. They all got out there and did their best, and though the tricky conditions caught out more than one of them, nobody was really hurt and it gave the few who hadn't been there before a reasonable chance of working out exactly where the place goes.

Qualifying was still windy but sunny and dry. Jorge Lorenzo made history by becoming the first rookie since these things started being recorded back in 1974 to take three consecutive pole positions in his rookie season. That they are the first three races of the season is even more impressive. And not only that, but he was a full one and a half seconds inside the previous lap record, set by Nicky Hayden last year, and faster even than Rossi's qualifying lap in 2006 on the bigger, ostensibly faster 990 Yamaha. He'll be starting next to current championship leader Dani Pedrosa while Valentino Rossi is third, just under half a second off pole. The next row is headed up by Nicky Hayden, ahead of the Tech 3 Yamaha pairing of Colin Edwards and James Toseland, the latter's lack of circuit knowledge really working against him here. Toseland, by the way, has already confirmed that he will be remaining with the Tech3 squad next year, freeing him to concentrate on racing and learning circuits rather than contractual worries. Fellow rookie Andrea Dovizioso leads row three from Randy de Puniet and Casey Stoner, the Australian champion currently having a bit of a torrid time making the Ducati work for him. John Hopkins rounds out the top ten.

Race day, though windy, was dry and sunny. Right up until the race was about to start, when the rain which had been threatening to mess things up all morning, finally arrived. And then went away again, before returning to sort of skulk around the corner and look menacing every now and again. In short, it wasn't an easy time to make a tyre choice. But more on that in a minute.

Casey Stoner seemed to have shaken off whatever it was that had so upset his performance earlier in the weekend, the Australian rider storming through the field to be by far the fastest. But, as I think I say every race report, warmup, qualifying, free practice are all a very different story to the race itself. And when the lights went out to signal the beginning of twenty eight laps of mayhem, it was a real bundle, with the leading positions changing almost on a corner by corner basis. The occasional raindrop didn't help make life easier for riders picking their way through a track already suffering from some damp patches, and a few heart in the mouth moments lay in wait for anyone too ambitious on cool tyres. By the end of the lap, both Repsol Honda riders had enjoyed big scary slides and dropped off slightly while the Yamaha pairing of Lorenzo and Rossi swapped the lead between them after yielding the first corner to Pedrosa. The real surprise was Andrea Dovizioso who stormed up from seventh on the grid to finish the lap third while Hopkins fired the Kawasaki up from tenth to end the first lap fifth. Toseland had a dire start, riding overly cautiously and getting mugged in the melee to end up eleventh.

Starting the second lap, Rossi slipped past Lorenzo and immediately started to extend a slight gap over the pursuing pack. But the following group stayed very tight, and for nine more laps it all stayed pretty constant at the front. Rossi made a bit of space between himself and Lorenzo while Pedrosa climbed all over the back of the second place Yamaha. Dovizioso and Hopper both sat just behind, while Edwards and Hayden maintained a watching brief half a second or so further back. In fact, for this period, the real race took place slightly behind this leading group as Chris Vermeulen, Casey Stoner, James Toseland, Randy de Puniet and Loris Capirossi all vied for position. The champion seemed to have all sorts of problems, his Ducati bucking and sliding all over the place before spitting a piece of electronics out of the fairing. Stoner had to grab the black box hanging off the end of its wire and stuff it back inside the fairing. Must have been a little distracting though it seemed to have little ill effect on the Ducati's performance.

On lap eleven, Pedrosa managed to get past Lorenzo and set off after Rossi. It had seemed that the Yamaha was holding Pedrosa up for a few laps as everyone had bunched up, so it was a little surprising that although Pedrosa was able to inch closer to Rossi, Lorenzo and the rest of the pack went with him. Two laps later and Lorenzo made a masterful move to take second back from his arch rival, while a couple of corners later he managed to pass Rossi on the tight chicane - a place where normally the only person you'd see overtaking anyone is Rossi himself. And then we were treated to a masterclass of dominant riding as the young Spaniard gave the Yamaha its head and simply galloped off into the distance. Well, maybe not quite, but there was certainly no chance of anyone catching Lorenzo as he turned in fastest lap after fastest lap to guarantee that this time he'd turn a pole position into a win. Lap thirteen saw Rossi succumb to the tyre problems he had clearly been having for a while and drop to third while Pedrosa vainly chased Lorenzo. Dovizioso, Hayden and Colin Edwards had all got the better of John Hopkins while Toseland was prevailing in his tussle. Lap sixteen saw Dovizioso sadly taking an early bath as he lost the front of his Honda, followed a lap later by Nicky Hayden. Casey Stoner, meantime, had clearly found something to adjust o the Ducati that worked for him as he increased his pace and was soon challenging for positions again. It took him until lap twenty-one to get past Toseland but get past he did, and the Englishman had no answers. Indeed, Toseland was involved in real scrap with Randy de Puniet who was going brilliantly and had just managed to get past the Superbike champion in a move that saw him go through, barely under control while Toseland wisely backed off and let him go when, just a few corners later, the Frenchman also lost the front and slid out.

And that was it. Jorge Lorenzo rode an absolute textbook race to take his first win. Dani Pedrosa came in a respectable but clearly disappointed second, nearly two seconds behind, while Valentino Rossi maintained his unbroken on-podium record to finish third, over ten seconds behind Pedrosa. Colin Edwards was closing on Rossi all the time and took an excellent fourth while John Hopkins was fifth. Casey Stoner regrouped to take sixth, ahead of James Toseland who himself was followed by Vermeulen and Capirossi with Shinya Nakano rounding out the top ten.

The Tech3 Yamaha riders had made great use of their new engine, and when they hit a circuit that is a little more familiar to them both you should expect great things. Pedrosa rode well, admitting that he had made a mistake and asked for too low a gear on his Honda so that it ran out of revs on the straight and therefore didn't have the speed it needed. Stoner remains the only person who can ride the Ducati, with Marco Melandri, a multiple GP winner on other machinery, languishing in thirteenth, sandwiched between the Alice team of Elias and Guintoli. Bridgestone still have six riders in the top ten, but significantly they only have three in the top seven. Valentino Rossi just might have made a tactical error in abandoning Michelin, whose technical development has been astonishing over the closed season. We'll see.

Next time we're in China. The fastest, longest straight on the calendar and one of the hardest braking areas following it. We sometimes get some pretty good racing there - certainly we had one of the best ever Capirossi/Rossi scraps a couple of years ago. While that's unlikely now, there's still hope for an excellent round...

SB

Portuguese MotoGP Results

1. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha)
2. Dani Pedrosa (Honda)
3. Valentino Rossi (Yamaha)
4. Colin Edwards (Yamaha)
5. John Hopkins (Kawasaki)
6. Casey Stoner (Ducati)
7. James Toseland (Yamaha)
8. Chris Vermeulen (Suzuki)
9. Loris Capirossi (Suzuki)
10. Shinya Nakano (Honda)

MotoGP standings (after three rounds)

1. Jorge Lorenzo 61
2. Dani Pedrosa 61
3. Valentino Rossi 47
4. Casey Stoner 40
5. James Toseland 29
6. Loris Capirossi 26
7. John Hopkins 24
8. Colin Edwards 22
9. Andrea Dovizioso 21
10. Nicky Hayden 19