100 victories: Rossi’s incredible journey

Valentino Rossi’s flawless march to victory over the weekend at the Alice TT Assen made him just the second rider in history to reach 100 GP triumphs, with one of his idols Giacomo Agostini being the only other rider to have achieved such a feat courtesy of his incredible 122 wins.

In tribute to Rossi’s historic achievement, motogp.com today offers three videos tracking the Italian’s spectacular route to glory in the three World Championship categories over a 14 year period.

The first video, “Rossi’s Road to 100GP wins: The 125& 250cc years”, features footage of his very first race victory in the 125cc class at Brno in 1996 with Aprilia.

Also featured are his 12th career victory at Sentul in Indonesia at the end of 1997, which made him the first rider ever to achieve 11 125cc wins in one season, and victory number 26 in Rio in 1999, his ninth of that season, which gave him the points to become the youngest ever 250cc World Champion at that time.

In “Rossi’s Road to 100GP wins: The 500cc era”, fans can views clips of The Doctor’s first ever premier class success, at Donington in 2000. That victory, in just his ninth ever 500cc race and the 27th win of his career, made Rossi the first rider ever to complete the hat-trick of wins at the British circuit in all three categories.

The ‘500cc era’ video also recalls Rossi’s 2001 Suzuka triumph, which put him top of the premier class standings for the first time, and marked Honda’s 500th GP win across all three classes. The video concludes in Rio in 2001, where Rossi achieved his 39th career victory and his 11th win of that year, in the last ever 500cc race.

“Rossi’s Road to 100GP wins: The MotoGP Era”, meanwhile, gets underway with victory number 40 at Suzuka with Honda, in the first ever four-stroke MotoGP contest. Next up is win 49 at Rio in 2002, which gave Rossi his first ever ‘MotoGP’ title.

The last video continues with some additional famous victories from recent seasons. His 60th GP success was a particularly important one as Rossi scored a victory in his first race on a Yamaha (2004/Welkom, South Africa) to become the first rider to take back-to-back victories in the premier-class riding machines from two different manufacturers.

When Rossi equaled Mick Doohan’s record of 54 premier class wins, at Losail in Qatar in 2006, it was the 78th of his career in all classes. Le Mans 2008 brought Rossi level with Ángel Nieto on 90 wins, and the MotoGP Era video features that triumph along with win number 99 and a brilliant battle with team-mate Jorge Lorenzo, beating the Spaniard in his home race at Catalunya on the last corner.