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Valentino Rossi won the 2009 MotoGP World Championship as everyone wanted and has been predicted. It has been 13 years now and the doctor is still pushing the bikes to a limit he didn't know existed, making 2009 the most exciting season in MotoGP for as far as most motorcycle enthusiasts can remember.

What a day it was at Sepang in Malaysia. The 250 cc was a cracker of a race as the top three riders who are going to race in premier class in 2010 were battling it out for the highest place on the podium. For about 5 laps, Hiroshi Aoyama and Marco Simonchelli were going flat out to lead the race, exchanging positions on every other corner.

Just when I was wondering of possibility of a crash as the two boys got rough; Hiroshi pulls a maneuver on Marco and disappears into the empty track ahead. Much to Marco's disbelief, Alvaro Bautista comes from behind and pushes Marco as wide as possible at the last corner of the last lap.

The two finished at exactly the same time and the stewards had to actually think of a reason for awarding one of the two the second place. Alvaro Bautista was awarded that position as he had clocked a better personal lap than Marco Simonchelli.

Till then the conditions were frying hot and humidity was reaching levels when you just don't want to have any leather clothes on yourself. Precisely five minutes before the 800 cc bikes were to be rolled out of the pit lane torrential rains started to pour and reminded of the unfortunately red flagged Malaysian F1 GP. Race declared as wet and delayed by 30 minutes.

As the riders approached the grid to line up, rains had pretty much stopped but there was enough water on the track to swim. At this moment the riders and teams are in a state of paranoia as they realise not a single session held at Sepang since Friday was a wet one and there was just no data to set the bike up for a wet race, forget understanding the wet tyres Bridgestone got to Sepang.

It was anyone’s race, literally. One with the better setup manages to control the bike better and will possibly win the race. Valentino Rossi and James Toseland decide to do the sighting lap twice just to feel the water at various corners, in the midst of all this Jorge Lorenzo's number 1 bike is refusing to start. He has no option to hop onto the spare bike which also was on wet tyres thanks to the team’s quick actions. But he looses too much time and had to start the race from back of the grid.

On a day when the two Fiat Yamaha team-mates and the fiercest rivals were supposed to go flat out and make it one more of the 'Yamaha duo' races, Lorenzo is in deep trouble, but rains come as a ray of light for him as it changes the game to a degree we cannot understand.

Rossi is at pole position hoping to do gather all the courage and experience of previous wet races and win it in the most clean possible way as possible. Only to finish 4th and win the championship, if it doesn't happen there is still one more race to go.

Lorenzo at the back of the grid has nothing to loose now, seemed as cool as possible even though he is starting from pit lane as opposed to the first row next to Rossi.

Lap 1 was when most of the overtaking happened, Dani took lead as usual and lost it to Rossi, Rossi ran wide on turn 1 and dropped 8 positions, Stoner is about to ram into the empty space ahead by the end of the lap, Lorenzo is suddenly out of no where ahead of Rossi. Phew!

Now it was just damage limitation mode for Valentino as Lorenzo is not looking strong and closing in, as the pack spread out and all follow a single riding line Lorenzo overtakes Rossi and stays there for quite some time but then he started feeling wheel-spin and had to depend a lot on the traction control system to keep him planted and left Rossi to do his own thing.

Rossi got to finish 3rd and be on the podium at the championship winning race, thanks to Dovizioso who crashed out from 3rd position behind Dani at the closing moments of the race. Stoner by now was about to cross the finish line with a lead of 17.5 seconds over Dani Pedrosa. The Australians victory was completely overshadowed one mire time like at Japan in 2008 by Rossi title winning scene. But Stoner looked stronger than ever and more than anyone else has the whole season, thanks to the three race break he took due to the mystery energy draining illness he was suffering.

Time for one of Valentino Rossi's championship celebrations and I was thinking what could it be more than the possible outcome of the race. Vale's fan club as usual headed by his father gather at a point on track and present Rossi with a t-shirt saying 'Gallina Vecchia' which he later explained "The t-shirt and the celebration is called the 'Gallina Vecchia!" In Italian we say that the old chicken makes good soup, but it's no use for laying eggs. I am old now, 30, but this old hen has made another egg today and now we have nine!”

Rossi might be the oldest amongst the top riders but surely the smartest and quickest one ever. He has bounced back after a two years bad phase in 06 and 07 to surpass Wayne Rainey and Kenny Roberts hatrick and the only record left for him to break is Giacomo Agostini's 15 world championship titles.

One of the biggest virtues of a world champion is physical fitness, all of the top four riders except Rossi have been injured and lost out on races due to that. Rossi has been the most consistent ever, never crashing in practice or qualifying and missing out the points only on two occasions i.e. LeMans & Indianapolis. Had Lorenzo, Pedrosa and Stoner been fit right from the start till end without any fractures and illness the championship would had been much different.

So is this chicken really old or is it a sarcastic joke on the youngsters in MotoGP, especially the 22 year old team mate Jorge Lorenzo ?

Here are some numbers and achievements of Valentino Rossi:
• Rossi has now matched Mike Hailwood and Carlo Ubbiali with nine titles in all classes. Only Agostini with 15 has more.
• Rossi’s win in Assen this season made him only the second rider in history to take 100 wins in all classes. Rossi now has 103, 19 less than Agostini’s all-time record of 122.
• He already held the all-time premier class victories record, having beaten Agostini’s tally at Indianapolis in 2008. He now a premier-class win tally of 77.
• Rossi’s win this season in Brno saw him take the all-time podium record with his 160th podium in all classes. He is also the only rider to have stood on the podium in the premier-class more than 100 times. Today’s podium was his 163rd in all classes.
• With 44 wins from 102 races since he joined the Japanese factory in 2004, Rossi is the most successful Yamaha rider of all time. He has 21 more wins than Kenny Roberts, Yamaha’s next most successful rider.
• 2009 title means he has now won more titles for Yamaha than for any of the other manufacturers he has ridden for in his career.
• His win at Misano, Italy this year was his 11th win in all classes on home soil.
• He is the only rider in history to have won at least one GP in 14 successive seasons.
Other facts about Rossi’s career
• In 1997 Rossi became the second youngest ever 125cc World Champion after scoring 321 points and eleven wins.
• Two years later, he became the youngest ever 250cc World Champion with nine wins.
• In 2001 Rossi joined Phil Read as one of only two riders ever to win the 125cc, 250cc and 500cc titles.
• Rossi’s debut victory for Yamaha at the opening race of 2004 in South Africa made him the first rider in history to take back-to-back wins for different manufacturers.
• After winning the MotoGP World Championship three times with Honda, Rossi took his fourth premier-class title with Yamaha in 2004 and became the only rider other than Eddie Lawson to win consecutive premier-class titles for different manufacturers.
• Rossi remains the only rider to win the premier-class title on four different types of motorcycle: 500cc 4-cylinder two-stroke, 990cc 5-cylinder four-stroke, Yamaha 990cc 4-cylinder four-stroke and a Yamaha 800cc 4-cylinder four-stroke.
• Rossi has never missed a GP since his 125cc debut in 1996. He has started 226 successive races in all classes, 166 of which have been in the premier class. Both of these are records.

World Championships: 9 (7 x MotoGP/500cc, 1 x 250cc, 1 x 125cc)
GP victories: 103 (77 x MotoGP/500cc, 14 x 250cc, 12 x 125cc)
GP podiums: 163 (126 x MotoGP/500cc, 21 x 250cc, 15 x 125cc)
GP Pole Positions: 58 (47 x MotoGP/500cc, 5 x 250cc, 5 x 125cc)
First GP: Malaysia, 1996 (125cc)
First GP win: Czech Republic, 1996 (125cc)
GP starts: 226 (166 x MotoGP/50cc, 30 x 250cc, 30 x 125cc)

Do I need to say more?