Valentino Rossi prepares for the farewell step. After 15 seasons, interrupted by the two years with Ducati, Portimao will be his last weekend as an official Yamaha rider, before getting on the Petronas M1 team in 2021: “It’s the end of a very long journey together – said the Doctor on the eve of the first free practices – Our story has been divided into two parts, the first part and the second part: like in a movie. The first half was unforgettable from a sporting point of view, we almost always won. Yamaha gave me the opportunity to return to the factory team after two disappointing years with Ducati, when I was already old enough. I will always be grateful: it was a very difficult moment in my career, I was quite desperate and without that possibility maybe I would have even stopped “.
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Even if the second part of his adventure with the Japanese house did not give him the same satisfactions as the first, Vale knows how much this marriage was important for the history of motorcycling: “I think I am a very important rider for Yamaha, because I brought them back to championship victory in 2004, after more than 20 years. I think I have shown together with them that Yamaha could be a winning bike, a top bike. , they were suffering for many years. I think I’m the rider who has won the most with Yamaha, so our history will be forever united. “
Rossi will be back on the grid again next year in what is likely to be his last season as a MotoGP rider. There will be no two historical rivals like Andrea Dovizioso e Cal Crutchlow, who will be at his side as a test driver: “I’m sorry that Dovi and Cal are leaving at the end of the season, especially because they were the two drivers closest to me in age, so they leave me alone – he joked – I have a good relationship with both of them, we did a lot of races together, a lot of battles. Andrea I remember when we were racing with the minibikes, I was 11 years old and he was little … He was a great driver, I hope this is not the end for him, I hope to see Dovizioso again in MotoGP to race against it again. “
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