Assen confuses the heck out of people, falling as it does on the Saturday for reasons long lost in the mists of time. And following less than a week after the British round at Silverstone it gives precious little opportunity for the riders and teams to rest and recover before the whole business starts again. To make matters worse, the next round, in Catalunya, is also just a week away so everyone will be distinctly frayed by the end.

Anyway. Assen itself has bee the subject of so many cliches that I really don't want to add to them here. Suffice it to say that the circuit hasn't changed since our last visit for SBK a few months ago, or indeed since the last GP here last year. It's still fast and flowing, it still has that tight arena section and it's still a rider's track. Enough said.

Valentino Rossi is still absent, of course, though he is at least out of hospital and properly on the mend now. I'm guessing he's also climbing the walls with frustration, both at the enforced inactivity and at the situation shaping up in the championship. Because his bete noir, Jorge Lorenzo, is simply running away with it. There's nobody seriously able to challenge the young Spaniard, and that might just mean that he's on the best bike as well as being the best rider out there right now. I can't help wondering what Valentino will make of that.

Anyway. The grid is rather depleted, with Yamaha's Rossi stand-in not joining until Catalunya. Hiroshi Aoyama's temporary replacement, Kousuke Akiyoshi, took his place on the Interwetten Honda, but to counter that we lost Marco Melandri after a nasty practice highside. So yet again we found ourselves in the crazy situation of only needing to finish, regardless of the distance off the lead, to get a championship point as only fifteen riders started.

As for the rest of practice and qualifying, it was really the Lorenzo show as the Spaniard utterly dominated throughout. Casey Stoner, Nicky Hayden, Dani Pedrosa and Randy de Puniet all made forays toward the top of the timesheets, but it was always Lorenzo on top when the chequered flag came out. Qualfying was a fairly steady affair, with plenty of riders taking their turn at the top - nine of the fifteen on the grid, in fact - but it was always Lorenzo who managed to pull something out of the hat to go faster. Then perhaps Stoner or de Puniet or even Lors Capirossi would take a turn at the front before again being pipped by the Spaniard. And so it continued, with the session ending as Lorenzo put in another fastest lap to pass his own previous fastest. The ever improving Randy de Puniet took second from Casey Stoner with 2009 SBK champion and MotoGP rooki Ben Spies heading the second row from Nicky Hayden and Andrea Dovizioso. Pedrosa, Simoncelli and Colin Edwards made up row three, with Aleix Espargaro rounding out the top ten.

So it continued in warm-up, as Lorenzo maintained his perfect record on what was looking increasingly likely to be a whitewash for the young Yamaha rider.

On to the race, then. Lights out and again it was Lorenzo who got the holeshot from lighting starters Spies and Pedrosa, who dropped into second and third ahead of Stoner and Dovizioso. And it wasn't long before the dominance of the Lorenzo/Yamaha combination started to show further, the Spaniard starting to pull clear from the following pair. But it soon became clear that Spies was, in fact, holding the rest of the pack up as both Pedrosa and Stoner managed to slip by him and close up on Lorenzo again to at least make a bit of a race out of things.

Spies also yielded a place to Dovizioso and was coming under pressure from de Puniet, who had started badly and had to work his way back through the field but was still over a second behind by halfway through.

By this stage Stoner was looking for a way through on Pedrosa but could not find one, and Lorenzo started to again edge away, extending his advantage little by little as the laps flew by. Further back Spies regrouped and closed right up on Dovizioso, repassing the Italian Honda rider to move into fourth. De Puniet, too, was on a mission, closing right up with the group in an attempt to atone for his disastrous start-line performance..

At the front Lorenzo, Pedrosa and Stoner became further spread out, whilst De Puniet and Dovizioso fought intensely to the very end, the Frenchman enjoying a few rather interesting moments as the tyres on the LCR Honda finally began to cry "Enough!" and give up their uneven battle for grip against horsepower.

Lorenzo eventually crossed the line nearly three seconds ahead of Pedrosa, with Stoner taking his first podium of the season in third. Spies finished a well deserved fourth, with Dovizioso edging out De Puniet for fifth with an heroic overtake on the chicane just before the finish line.

Nicky Hayden, Colin Edwards, Marco Simoncelli and Aleix Espargaró completed the top ten in a fairly static race. But with such a depleted field how can it be anything else, really? There is so much potential space between the bikes on track that everyone has room to ride an optimum lap. And with control tyres, similar power and skill, how can anyone possibly go significantly faster? It's surely just down to racecraft, bike stup and sheer bottle now.

Next time out is Catalunya. That'll be Lorenzo's home circuit. Hmm. Want to bet against him? Me neither...

Assen MotoGP Results

1. Jorge Lorenzo (Yamaha)
2. Dani Pedrosa (Honda)
3. Casey Stoner (Ducati)
4. Ben Spies (Yamaha)
5. Andrea Dovizioso (Honda)
6. Randy de Puniet (Honda)
7. Nicky Hayden (Ducati)
8. Colin Edwards (Yamaha)
9. Marco Simoncelli (Honda)
10. Aleix Espargo (Ducati)

MotoGP standings (after six rounds)

1. Jorge Lorenzo 140
2. Dani Pedrosa 93
3. Andrea Dovizioso 89
4. Valentino Rossi 61
5. Nicky Hayden 61
6. Randy de Puniet 56
7. Casey Stoner 51
8. Ben Spies 49
9. Marco Simoncelli 39
10. Colin Edwards 34