A confident Casey Stoner extended his lead in the MotoGP championship this weekend with another top performance on his Ducati.

With the long straight at the Shanghai track, he was able to exploit his Ducati's top speed. During the race warm-ups, Stoner recorded 337 km/h, compared to Valentino Rossi's 325 km/h. It is safe to say the young Aussie has talent, but the speed differential on the Chinese track was always going to be difficult for the Yamaha to peg back.

Taking nothing away from the Kurri Kurri Kid, he rode a great race. He started from fourth on the grid and took the lead at the beginning of the second. Rossi fought hard throughout the first 15 laps, but in what is becoming a common occurrence in 2007, Valentino made a mistake on the hairpin turn. He went off the track and was not able to recover sufficiently enough to pressure Stoner for the rest of the race. In fact by race end Stoner lead and won by over three seconds from the charging Italian.

In other results, John Hopkins aboard the Rizla Suzuki, finally got his just rewards and found himself on the podium less than seven seconds behind Stoner. Last year's race winner, Dani Pedrosa, came in fourth a somewhat distant 14 seconds later.

Current World No 1 Nicky Hayden had more bad luck and was hit from behind by Toni Elias on lap two. Whilst Elias retired from the race, the Kentucky Kid was able to salvage 12th. Surprisingly he is still fourth in the championship despite not having a podium finish to date. This could be a telling factor in his title defence as the season progresses. If Stoner and Rossi have a few DNFs he will quickly become a major player for the No. 1 plate again in 2007.

With Stoner's third win this year, the pundits have already begun salivating at the chance of another Australian holding the coveted Championship crown. While it is still early days, and with Stoner himself downplaying the comparisons, I must admit that the prospect is exciting. Rossi's Yamaha will be stronger at the European tracks where outright top speed is less of a factor, but if Stoner can keep the rubber side down, he will have a strong chance of etching his name in the record books like Doohan and Gardiner before him.