Jorge Lorenzo took his 9th win of the season in sparkling style at the final round of the season of MotoGP in Valencia. In front of his home crowd he wore a special one off crystal-studded X-Lite X-802 helmet, hand painted in gold and covered in 1,800 Swarovski crystals applied to the top in the shape of his logo, to celebrate his world championship in flamboyant style.
In the race he dropped to 5th after a front row start on the grid and slowly worked his way through the field. Early on in the race he avoided a crash when he touched bikes with Marco Simoncelli and then went on to pass his rivals one by one, finally overtaking Casey Stoner at the front on lap 23 of 30 and carrying on to victory.
Celebrating his title Lorenzo said, “Winning here in front of my home crowd at this special track is one of the happiest moments of my life”.
Casey Stoner in his Nolan X-802 finished in second place having led for much of the race but with 8 laps of the 30 remaining he was passed by Lorenzo. Casey, who set the fastest pace in practice started from pole but was affected by tyre choice selecting the harder rear compound tyre for the race whilst Lorenzo and Rossi both went with the medium option. Casey finished 4th in the championship overall and now leaves Ducati after 4 years with the company.
Fellow Nolan riders, Marco Melandri and Carlos Checa finished the race in 13th and 15th positions respectively. Marco’s season has been be-set with technical difficulties and this was reflected in his final place in the championship table.
The Nolan Group would like to thank all of their riders for a fantastic year and their dedication and wish them a great season in 2011.
