Valencia MotoGP: Stoner takes final 2008 MotoGP win

Casey Stoner has taken the win at Valencia for the final MotoGP race of 2008.

Stoner took the lead on the first lap and held it to the flag, pulling out a massive lead over second placed man Dani Pedrosa.

Third place went to Valentino Rossi to take his 16th podium out of 18 races. The Italian started down in 10th and had to work hard to push through the pack, but just couldn’t beat the pace of Stoner or Pedrosa to get anywhere near them at the end of the race.

Andrea Dovisioso got an incredible start and followed Rossi as he made his way through the pack eventually finishing in fourth. He got back to his garage after the race to find 250 man Yuki Takahashi holding a sign telling Dovi to hand him the bike he will ride next year and head next door to the Repsol garage where Dovi will ride in 2009.

Nicky Hayden completed his last race after nine years with Honda in fifth place before he takes to the factory Ducati for tomorrow’s test of the 2009 bikes.

Jorge Lorenzo finished the race in eighth behind Colin Edwards and Shinya Nakano which hands him the rookie of the year trophy and gives Yamaha a clean sweep of all the available trophies in the premiere class.

James Toseland struggled during the race, dropping back from his fifth place qualifying to spend most fo the race fighting for eleventh and twelfth. He eventually finished in 11th after Marco Melandri made a mistake and dropped back.