Home favorite Valentino Rossi mastered championship leader Sete Gibernau and the weather to win a rain-interrupted MotoGP race at the Italian Grand Prix on Sunday.
With six of the 23 laps remaining, rain halted the event. Following the re-start Rossi on his Yamaha briefly dropped back to fifth, but cut through the field to the cross the line comfortably ahead of his main championship rival.
Rossi was timed at 12 minutes 06.803 seconds for the last six laps with Gibernau on 12:07.164 and Italy's Max Biaggi on 12:08.343.
The victory was the five-times world champion's third in a row at Mugello and helped him close the gap in the overall standings. Gibernau leads the championship on 86 points, 10 more than Rossi, who has moved ahead of Biaggi on 72.
Rossi's victory also ended Honda's 11-year stranglehold on the Italian title.
"It was an incredible race and an incredible feeling to win in front of all these fans," Rossi said. "It was like I had to win two races -- one in the dry, then in the wet."
Rossi made a superb start from third on the grid, reaching the opening corner first ahead of Biaggi and Ducati's Loris Capirossi.
Briefly, the home fans were tantalized with the possibility of a repeat of last year's clean sweep, when Rossi led Capirossi and Biaggi across the line, but Capirossi, who has struggled with Ducati's new bike, dropped off the pace.
Pole-sitter Gibernau, who had won the previous two rounds in Spain and France, made a poor start, falling back to eighth before working his way through the field.
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