Yamaha rider Valentino Rossi is looking to bounce back from the misfortunes he experienced in Motegi last weekend by scoring a top result in this weekend's Australian Grand Prix, the second in a triple header that will move to Malaysia then take the teams back to Europe for the season finale in Valencia.
The Doctors main focus is to climb up from fifth place in the championship rankings, where he has slipped to after recent events.
After securing 250cc victories in 1998 and 1999 and a 500cc third place in 2000, Valentino continued to work on an impressive résumé, enjoying a five-year winning streak from 2001 to 2005 in the premier class.
This was followed by five more consecutive podium finishes, taking second place in 2008 and 2009, and third place in 2006, 2007 and 2010.
The Italian revisited the Australian podium in 2013, 2014 and 2016, claiming a third, first and second place respectively.
“I have arrived in Australia after a complicated race, but I‘m in a good mood because I want to work in the best way possible with my team and fix the issues we had in Japan as quickly as possible to do nice races again,” he said. “Phillip Island is a circuit I really like and I hope that the weather here will be good to start working straight away in dry conditions. After the crash in Japan I'm feeling pretty good, just a little bit of pain. Now I hope for good weather for the entire weekend!”
