This year will be the 18th Valencia GP, which has been held every year at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo since the first visit in 1999. Here are some facts and stats before lights go out:
- This will be the 15th successive year that Valencia has hosted the final race of the season, making it the circuit that has been the venue for the final event of the year on most occasions.
- The Valencia circuit is named after Spanish racer Ricardo Tormo, who won the 50cc world title riding for Bultaco in 1978 and 1981. In addition to his 15 Grand Prix victories in the 50cc class he also had 4 wins in the 125cc class. His career ended in 1984 due to leg injuries suffered in a crash whilst test riding. Tormo sadly died from leukaemia in 1998.
- Dani Pedrosa (Repsol Honda Team) is the most successful rider at the Valencia circuit with six wins; three in MotoGP™, two in 250cc, and one in the 125cc class. Pedrosa has won twice as many GP races at the Valencia circuit than the next most successful riders who are: Casey Stoner (1 x 125cc, 2 x MotoGP™) and Jorge Lorenzo (3 x MotoGP™).
- The premier class race at Valencia has been won eight times by Spanish riders; Sete Gibernau won the 500cc race on a Suzuki in 2001; Dani Pedrosa won the MotoGP™ race in 2007, 2009 and 2012; Jorge Lorenzo (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) won in 2010, 2013 and 2015; Marc Marquez (Repsol Honda Team) won two years ago.
- Since the introduction of the four-stroke MotoGP™ formula in 2002, Honda has been the most successful manufacturer with eight victories at the Valencia circuit. Yamaha has had four wins and Ducati two.
- Andrea Dovizioso’s (Ducati Team) fourth place finish in 2014 is the best result for a Ducati rider at Valencia in the last five years.
- Suzuki’s only podium at Valencia in the MotoGP™ era was third, with John Hopkins in 2007.
- The MotoGP™ race at Valencia has only once been won by a rider who has not qualified on the front row - when Marquez won the race in 2014, from fifth on the grid.
- Valentino Rossi (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) is the only rider to have competed at all seventeen previous grand prix events that have taken place at the Ricardo Tormo circuit.
- The last non-Spanish rider to win the MotoGP™ race in Valencia was Casey Stoner in 2011.
- At least one of the three classes at the Valencia grand prix has been won by a Spanish rider for the last seven years.
- The last time the paddock arrived at the final race of the year in Valencia with all three titles already decided was in 2012, when Lorenzo won the MotoGP™ title and Marquez the Moto2™ title in Phillip Island, and Sandro Cortese won the Moto3™ Championship at Sepang.
- Since the season finale has been held in Valencia, the three newly-crowned World Champions have never each won their final race of the year.