By Robert Grant 17:28 AEST Mon Jan 7 2008
"World champion Casey Stoner is MotoGP's man of the year, claiming a clean sweep of major European awards.
Stoner ended the eight-year domination of the readers' polls by Italian superstar Valentino Rossi by claiming the prestigious Motosprint Rider of the Year crown.
The major award, from Italian publication Motosprint, will be presented to Stoner at Tuesday's joint Ducati-Ferrari global media launch for the 2008 season.
Stoner will share centre stage with Ferrari's 2007 F1 world champion Kimi Raikkonen as he receives the Motosprint award.
Raikkonen won the F1 world title, with six wins, in tense final race battle against star British rookie Lewis Hamilton.
Stoner has also been voted Man of the Year by two other mass circulation motorcycle weeklies - Motorcycle News in the UK and the German language MotorsportAktuell, which combines both F1 and MotoGP in its news pages.
All of the awards are based on reader voting, reflecting the massive surge in Stoner's star status in Europe since he won 10 races and the 2007 MotoGP world title with Ducati.
"It's a very nice feeling to have an award that was voted by the fans and I'm amazed at the number of people who have taken an interest in what I have achieved with Ducati this season - it was team effort," Stoner said.
"Winning the world championship was my childhood dream and Valentino was one of my idols, who I now get to race against."
Stoner's fast and fearless riding, which prompted Rossi to describe the young Australian as a God, carried Ducati to its first ever premier class championship.
The editor of Motosprint, Stefano Saragoni, said Stoner's win in the poll ended Rossi's eight-year domination of the voting, since the Italian star was 250cc champion in 1999.
"Casey scored 52 per cent of the total votes, out-polling Valentino (14 per cent) by three-to-one which is evidence of how the fans enjoyed both his skill and style."
Following this week's global media launch at the Italian ski resort of Madonna do Campiglio Ferrari and Ducati will begin pre-season testing - Raikkonen at Jerez in Spain and Stoner in Malaysia later this month."
This showing of popularity amongst the European population would seem to make lie of the contention that Casey's domination of the season has adversely affected his standing in their eyes?
"World champion Casey Stoner is MotoGP's man of the year, claiming a clean sweep of major European awards.
Stoner ended the eight-year domination of the readers' polls by Italian superstar Valentino Rossi by claiming the prestigious Motosprint Rider of the Year crown.
The major award, from Italian publication Motosprint, will be presented to Stoner at Tuesday's joint Ducati-Ferrari global media launch for the 2008 season.
Stoner will share centre stage with Ferrari's 2007 F1 world champion Kimi Raikkonen as he receives the Motosprint award.
Raikkonen won the F1 world title, with six wins, in tense final race battle against star British rookie Lewis Hamilton.
Stoner has also been voted Man of the Year by two other mass circulation motorcycle weeklies - Motorcycle News in the UK and the German language MotorsportAktuell, which combines both F1 and MotoGP in its news pages.
All of the awards are based on reader voting, reflecting the massive surge in Stoner's star status in Europe since he won 10 races and the 2007 MotoGP world title with Ducati.
"It's a very nice feeling to have an award that was voted by the fans and I'm amazed at the number of people who have taken an interest in what I have achieved with Ducati this season - it was team effort," Stoner said.
"Winning the world championship was my childhood dream and Valentino was one of my idols, who I now get to race against."
Stoner's fast and fearless riding, which prompted Rossi to describe the young Australian as a God, carried Ducati to its first ever premier class championship.
The editor of Motosprint, Stefano Saragoni, said Stoner's win in the poll ended Rossi's eight-year domination of the voting, since the Italian star was 250cc champion in 1999.
"Casey scored 52 per cent of the total votes, out-polling Valentino (14 per cent) by three-to-one which is evidence of how the fans enjoyed both his skill and style."
Following this week's global media launch at the Italian ski resort of Madonna do Campiglio Ferrari and Ducati will begin pre-season testing - Raikkonen at Jerez in Spain and Stoner in Malaysia later this month."
This showing of popularity amongst the European population would seem to make lie of the contention that Casey's domination of the season has adversely affected his standing in their eyes?
