Valentino Rossi Gracious in Victory

Sports legends are created by desire, passion and ability combining in an individual athlete to produce an athlete that continually rises above the waves of competition to victory despite the small margin between them and their competitors. The willingness to sacrifice body, mind and life in order to be considered among or the best in a chosen sport, isn’t a quality all humans have and I am not sure many of us would live long or be competing for long with this as a common trait. Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo are two athletes with this common trait of being able to rise above their fear and all athletes competing in sports at a championship level need this skill in order to compete.

Jorge Lorenzo congratulates Rossi on his seventh MotoGP Premier Class Championship

There’s a certain swagger that goes with being a successful athlete, especially one who has achieved at the level of Rossi, who just clinched his seventh MotoGP Premier Class World Championship with his twelfth podium finish of the 2009 season at the race in Malaysia, the 163^rd time he has stood on the podium in his Hall of Fame MotoGP career. Not to say that he has an arrogant walk, because I don’t think that he does, not like an athlete like Alex Rodriguez, a baseball player who is considered by some to be the greatest player to ever play on a field of dreams. Rossi has a calm kind of serenity as he walks around the track that is confident, yet humble in a way, which is something that must come with years of treading the racing paddock.

Winning a single MotoGP Premier Class Championship is a major achievement for any racer, let along seven, and nine in all classes in total. Rossi has been pushed all season by Jorge Lorenzo and in a funny kind of way Valentino owes the young Spaniard a debt of thanks for being as good as he has been and making Valentino rise to the occasion, which is a major one in history. Jorge is learning from the best in the business what it takes to be a seven time MotoGP Premier Class World Champion and in the coming years we’ll see if Jorge has what it takes to achieve the feats of a racer like Rossi. Rossi’s achievements on a bike should never be down played, it’s often hard enough to ride a bike efficiently without doing harm to ourselves and others, let along race at speeds that are commonly hazardous to life and limb for years on end and come out on top time after time.

“Image: Zuma Press”