In the 17th and final round of the MotoGP season at Valencia saw an upset even before the race began with Casey Stoner who was hugely tipped to win, highsiding on the sighting lap, crashing, leaving his Ducati too damaged to restart.
Dani Pedrosa took off with another of his lightning starts got the holeshot and won the race flag to flag, his second of the season.
Toni Elias was another rider who had rocket start, and by the end of the first turn was second but it would last until the third lap when Jorge Lorenzo overtook him.
Valentino Rossi who was fourth quickly overtook Elias, hunted down his team mate and when Lorenzo’s Yamaha nearly discharged him from the seat, Rossi got past and was in second place with Pedrosa already more than 2.
5s clear.
It seems that Lorenzo’s Daniese air leathers deployed with the almost highside.
The positions in front were almost frozen when Lorenzo started to remount on Rossi in the final stages of the race and was less than one second behind with less than three laps to go, but Rossi just controlled his second place and finished in front of Lorenzo.
Colin Edwards took fourth and also fifth place in the standings away from Honda factory rider Andrea Dovizioso with a little help from his fellow Texan, Ben Spies.
Spies in his Yamaha debut rode an impressive race despite dropping to twelfth place after the start of the race, but was able to fight his way to seventh overtaking DoviziosoNicky Hayden ended his first difficult year in Ducati with a fifth, two seconds behind Edwards and ahead of Toni Elias who was riding his last race in MotoGP and took seventh place in the championship standings that was up for grabs between six riders.
Ninth went to Mika Kallio and Alex de Angelis, who has yet to announce where he’ll be in 2010 completed the top ten.
James Toseland finished in twelfth place in his final race in MotoGP, while Chris Vermeulen also in his final race finished 15th.
MotoGP Valencia Race Results:1 Dani PEDROSA HONDA 46′47.
5532 Valentino ROSSI YAMAHA 46′50.
1833 Jorge LORENZO YAMAHA 46′50.
4664 Colin EDWARDS YAMAHA 47′20.
0685 Nicky HAYDEN DUCATI 47′22.
1386 Toni ELIAS HONDA 47′22.
4417 Ben SPIES YAMAHA 47′25.
2598 Andrea DOVIZIOSO HONDA 47′25.
9179 Mika KALLIO DUCATI 47′30.
04410 Alex DE ANGELIS HONDA 47′31.
24211 Randy DE PUNIET HONDA 47′33.
57112 James TOSELAND YAMAHA 47′37.
77913 Aleix ESPARGARO DUCATI 47′44.
72114 Loris CAPIROSSI SUZUKI 47′54.
43015 Chris VERMEULEN SUZUKI 47′59.
25416 Gabor TALMACSI HONDA 48′01.
95817 Marco MELANDRI KAWASAKI 48′20.
978
