Well, Valentino Rossi has done it again. In 2008 he won his eighth world title, his sixth in the big class.
With nine race wins, Rossi utterly blitzed them on tyres he'd had hardly any experience on before 2008. And he turned those Bridgestones into such an 'I Want' item that even Honda dumped Michelin before the end of the season in order to get them.
The domination of Casey Stoner in 2007, when he took ten victories, was still at the forefront of everybody's minds as we arrived under the floodlights of the very first night-time grand prix, in Qatar. Stoner promptly rode a wise race, winning it only after he'd let things settle down at the front. We all thought we'd be on for another Ducati show of power, but nothing could have been further from the truth as we had four different winners in the first four races.