Valentino Rossi Video
It’s well known that some of MotoGP’s top stars religiously train aboard motocross machines. One advocate of such training is nine-time World Champion Valentino Rossi.
The 32-year-old Italian who’s entering his second year with Ducati has always trained on the dirt, including the MotoRanch shown in the recently-released video above.
The Rossi YouTube video doesn’t include details of when it was recorded, and considering Rossi’s piloting a Yamaha with some Fiat graphics, it’s definitely from the pre-Ducati days. But regardless, it’s (rough) footage of Rossi, and already has over 107,000 plays since released on Jan. 22.
Although VR46 trains hard on the dirt, as obviously shown above, sometimes there’s injury. In 2010, the then Fiat Yamaha rider injured his right shoulder during an accident April 15 while motocross training in Pesaro in Italy.
The accident occurred before Round 2 of the 2010 MotoGP season in Jerez, but he still managed a third-place finish behind Repsol Honda rider Dani Pedrosa and race winner and teammate Jorge Lorenzo.
This was his first injury of the 2010 MotoGP season, preceding his horrific accident during practice in Mugello. During that wreck, Rossi broke his leg and missed that race and the subsequent three. This was the Rossi failed to start an event in his professional racing career. If he started at Mugello, it would have been his 231st consecutive start across all MotoGP classes.
On top of the broken tibia, the Italian soon learned the shoulder injury appeared worse than expected; Rossi injured a tendon during the MX wreck, but never had any treatment.
Rossi finished the 2010 MotoGP season in third place overall, and joined Ducati for 2011. But after a year of struggles aboard the Desmo, Rossi only earned seventh overall in points.
Vale’s first official outing of 2012 MotoGP, a year when the bikes move to the 1000cc capacity, will be at Sepang Jan. 31 through Feb. 2.
