Valentino shares his views on his championship lead, Stoner's crashes and meeting Diego Maradona
VALENTINO ROSSI is now more convinced than ever that MotoGP rival Casey Stoner's 2008 campaign has derailed after another tumble for the Aussie at Misano on Sunday.
Now with 75 points in hand over Stoner in the overall standings, Rossi told Spanish journalists: "At the beginning of the year I thought that I would have to be riding the best I ever have in order to challenge Stoner for the title so to be 75 points in the lead by now is amazing. But it has not been easy to do that.
"I have made many changes to be able to do what we have done so far. I am riding well and I have a great team with me. The people at Yamaha are very good and this year I have been able to have the Bridgestone tyres, there is a great relation between me and the tyres! Now everything goes better for me. I always have thought that I could fight against Stoner but I admit that I was worried in three races where he was so strong but from Laguna Seca things have changed. That race was a key point in the championship.
"Before we went there Stoner was on another planet… but we have managed to turn that around and now we are not so far away from him. And lately, clearly, he has committed two very important errors.
"Meeting Maradonna at Misano was very good. He has kissed me on the hand and then I thought about bending down and kissing his left foot, but we were in the grid getting ready to race and so it was a little complicated.
"He said to me: `You are history' and I told him: `No, you are history, always.'"
