PICTURES: Dovizioso slides out of Lorenzo battle.

250cc World Championship leader Andrea Dovizioso did all he could to stop Jorge Lorenzo taking his third win in a row at Donington Park on Sunday, but disaster struck when the Humangest Honda rider lost the front through the painfully slow final turn.

Until that accident, on lap 17 of 30, 'Dovi' had matched the Fortuna Aprilia rider's every move - after Lorenzo had made a 'no prisoners' move to take the lead from Dovizioso on lap two.

The pair had pulled a six-second lead over Alex de Angelis and Hiro Aoyama by the time Dovizioso fell. The Italian's mistake meant that his eight race podium run was brought to an end, but he at least salvaged some points by remounting to finish sixth.

However, Lorenzo's fifth win of the season - Dovizioso has only taken one victory - has now put the Spaniard just one point behind in the championship chase, with seven rounds to go.

"I was recovering on braking what I lost on the straights and it is normal to make mistakes when you push hard," claimed a dejected Dovi. "I've been racing like this since the beginning of the season, I'm always at the limit and in the last corner I lost the front as I braked too hard. I'm still leading the championship, but it isn't worth much as now our (performance) gap with Aprilia is too big.

"Today Lorenzo was fast, but I did my best to stay close to him like I've been doing since the beginning of this championship; if I didn't ride in this way, I wouldn't be the leader now. When I crashed out I spent a few laps to keep again the right pace because the footrest was damaged and the handlebar wasn't anymore in the right position," he added.

"Despite not being as quick as we wanted, when I started to push hard Dovizioso fell. I feel for him because you never want to see a rival fall, although it did allow me to make up a lot of championship points," said a surprising sympathetic Lorenzo, who has crashed out of two races this year. "We are just a point behind him now, but it is not the time to be thinking about that. We have to keep taking it race by race and our next objective is Germany."