Boo-hoo. It's all over for another year and I have to go into hibernation until spring when the familiar sound of 800cc farts back into life and gives us all some entertainment. However, before the doom and gloom of motorcycle emptiness swallows up for winter, lets have a look at the goings on in Valencia.
I was hoping Nicky Hayden could sign-off from Repsol Honda on a high and in the first couple of practice sessions he was red hot. Due to the varying but mostly wet weather conditions, I was quite surprised Hayden could run at that pace. When it comes to massively competent wet riders, Hayden isn't on my list. Maybe Valencia is a good track for Hayden? Maybe his memory of becoming 2006 world champion at the circuit was enough to motivate him? Whatever it was, he was great and the only rider to post a time under 1'48, with our favourite Stoner following about half a second behind. Valentino Rossi marks Valencia as one of his 'unluckier' tracks and this indeed seemed to be true with a lowly thirteenth on the timesheet.
Rossi's luck got a tiny bit worse in the second session of the day with a crash. Not a massive crash by any means, just a little lowside which probably only left a few scuffs on his leathers. Hayden topped the session with Dani Pedrosa just a tenth of a second behind him. I can't help but feel Hayden smiled at that.
On the third free practice session of the weekend, on the Saturday morning, Hayden was yet again the quickest rider. This wasn't a surprise. What was a surprise was Marco Melandri - the slowest man on a Ducati in western europe - posting the third fastest time of the session. If someone could explain to me exactly what happened there, I'd be happy to listen. Maybe the thought of never having to ride that hellish, beast of a bike ever again after Sunday was the motivator, then again, maybe it wasn't. Who knows.
The qualifying session in the afternoon was a varied mix of styles, speeds and setup changes. Starting out in mildly shitty dampness, the first half of the qualifying was a bit of a non-event and it didn't look like anyone was trying particularly hard. The second half, when the track dried out, was much more impressive. There were three notable instances in that qualifying session which stuck in my mind. The first of these instances was Tech 3 Yamaha's James Toseland having a lap ruined by Marco Melandri sitting on the track like a potato and not noticing and getting out of the way of the rapidly approaching yellow blob. I really think Toseland could've posted a better qualifying lap had this lap not been ruined. Ho hum.
The second event of the session was Nicky Hayden's 'slippery' qualifying lap. On his last qualifying tyre, Hayden put in a lap which, to be honest, scared the shit out of me. It's not often you see a bike sliding around in quite that manner with the front end sliding a bit first, rapidly followed by the rear sliding shortly afterwards. If you can imagine a creature which was a cross between a crab and a snake and could then imagine how such a beast would move, that's pretty much what Hayden's bike was doing. He was really, really trying and that effort was good enough to place him on the front row, in third position, for the race.
The third event was Stoner taking his ninth pole position of the season. Obviously, I want to see Stoner do well. I want to see him perform well. I want to see him win. These are natural wants. I'm happy he did it.
Now for the race. The good (or bad) thing about Valencia is that it's hard to pass people. It's narrow and it's twisty with no enormous, wide straight bits. This means the order people start in is not too dissimilar to how they finish. This also has the nasty habit of making races at Valencia fairly dull. I don't think it's a great place to end a season, personally, but what the hell, that's how it is and we'll all just have to live with it.
The race was quietly uneventful. Stoner started in 1st place, Pedrosa started in 2nd place and that's how they finished. Rossi managed to claw his way through the pack to take the final step on the podium as it seemed Hayden was struggling with his bike and only managed to take 5th in the end, just behind the man who's taking his place at Repsol Honda next year; Andrea Dovizioso. Now, the rider whose place Hayden is taking next year also managed to offer up some surprises. Starting in last place on the grid, Marco Melandri put in possibly his best performance of the year and found his way to 11th. I'm not sure what happened in the last few laps but he 'impressively' managed to finish in 16th. Can anyone shine any light on that?
So there we have it, the end of a season. Casey managed six race wins, nine pole positions, 11 podiums, 2nd place in the championship and [ahem] 2 DNFs. Although he didn't retain his world championship title, he put in a performance over the course of the season we should all, including Casey and Ducati, be proud of. Roll on 2009, roll on the GP9, roll on Hayden as a team mate and roll on more victories in what will be arguably the toughest season of competition in 10 years.
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