On Sunday, September 24, 2007 at the Japanese Grand Prix at
the Motegi circuit, Casey Stoner not only made history by winning
the 2007 MotoGP World Championship, amazingly, he became the
first rider to win the title on a European-manufactured motorcycle
since Phil Read did the deed in 1974 (on a 500cc-motivated MV
Agusta).
“Very nice,” smiled Stoner, the champion. “I really don’t know
what to say. We didn’t really expect to win the championship
here. We thought we’d go out and give it a go and try to score
some more points. But to come out and win the championship
with still three rounds to go, it’s an absolute dream. Just to win
the championship’s a dream. It’s nice that we can, I suppose,
give the people that believed in me a gift, which is this World
Championship, and to prove to the people that didn’t believe in
me we can do it. "It proves that if you never give up anything can
happen.”
For Ducati — the Italian-based bike builder — this Sunday
afternoon at Motegi was made all the more special as Loris
Capirossi won the Japanese Grand Prix in lights out to checkered
flag fashion. It wasn’t as easy, though, as the Grand Prix was
initiated on a wet track — and a track that would dry out as the
24-lap affair wound down towards its conclusion. At one point
during the somewhat chaotic race, Capirossi pitted to get slicks
and took from that point forward, took total control of the race on
lap number 15.
“I came in to get slick tires, but there was some problem with the
bike; I think the steering damper,” explained the Italian rider
after the race. “I had to loosen up the steering damper because I
kept running wide into the corners. From that point on I wasn’t so
confident, but I saw Valentino (Rossi) also had a problem and we
had an advantage. I started to relax a little bit more after that
and concentrated on finishing the race, staying in the dry lines,
and everything worked.”
When all was said and done, Capirossi crossed the finish line
10.853 ahead of runner-up Kawasaki’s Randy de Puniet. For De
Puniet, as well as the lime green motorcycle brand, the podium
finish was of cause for great joy. click on ozzy go to the full
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