The Gran Premio Movistar de Aragon is the 900th event counting towards the World Championship classification. With records continuing to be broken, it's going pretty well. Here's a few facts about the history of the Championship, which began way back...when?
- 1949. The Grand Prix World Championship series was introduced then with four classes for solo motorcycles: 500cc, 350cc, 250cc and 125cc.
- The very first race counting towards a World Championship classification was the 350cc race at the 1949 Isle of Man TT races, which took place on Monday 13th June and was won by British rider Freddie Frith on a Velocette.
- The venue that has hosted the greatest number of Grands Prix is Assen, where a World Championship meeting has taken place in every one of the 69 years of the series.
- After Assen, the venue that has held most Grands Prix is Brno in the Czech Republic, which has hosted a Grand Prix event on 48 occasions.
- The country that has hosted the greatest number of Grand Prix events is Spain, with 118 prior to this weekend: Jerez (31), Catalunya (26), Jarama (19), Valencia (18), Montjuich (17), and Aragon (7).
- The rider who has raced at the greatest number of Grand Prix events is Valentino Rossi (Movistar Yamaha MotoGP) with 360 GP starts, representing exactly 40% of all Grand Prix events that have taken place. Rossi has also started the most premier class races in history, currently 300.