Did you know…?
– Andrea Dovizioso will become World Champion if he wins the race and Márquez finishes 12th or worse.
– Since Casey Stoner won the title for Ducati in 2007, this is the first time that a rider for the Bologna brand has the opportunity to win the championship again.
– With Dovizioso’s victory and Lorenzo’s second place in Malaysia, this is the fourth time in history that two Ducatis finished in first and second position. The first time was at the Valencia GP in 2006 with Troy Bayliss and Loris Capirossi.
– There are 12 races in Ducati’s history where two of their riders have shared the podium. The first time was at the 2005 Malaysian GP with Capirossi’s win and Carlos Checa finishing third.
– Andrea Dovizioso is the Ducati rider who has shared the podium the most number of times with another rider for the manufacturer. Since Qatar 2015 there have been a total of 7 podiums where another Ducati rider has joined him on the box.
– In 2006, Troy Bayliss won the Superbike World Championship with Ducati, and for the final MotoGP race of the season the factory chose him to replace an injured Gibernau in Valencia. Bayliss won the race after a year of not participating in MotoGP and never again competed in the category.
– Ducati has two wins in Valencia: the 2006 victory with Troy Bayliss, and a win in 2008 with Casey Stoner.
– Jorge Lorenzo has four wins in Valencia, all of them in MotoGP: 2010, 2013, 2015 and 2016. Last year’s was his last victory in MotoGP. Jorge is the rider with the most wins in Valencia in MotoGP.
– In 2006, Lorenzo won nine races in the 250cc class but despite these victories he arrived at the final round in Valencia fighting for the title with Andrea Dovizioso. In the end, Jorge won his first World Championship title.
– Valencia celebrates 19 years of GP races. This year will be the 16th consecutive year that the track has hosted the final race of the season.
– The Ricardo Tormo circuit gets its name from the first Valencian rider to become World Champion. It is the second shortest track on the calendar and one of the slowest at barely 160 km/h on average, partly because there are five corners that are taken at below 100 km/h.
– The strongest braking of the entire circuit is in turn one, where riders go from 330 km/h to 128 km/h in 261 meters over 4.3 seconds. Although it is turn 12 where the most pressure is exerted on the brake lever with a load of 6.4 kg.
