• Alex Barros is scheduled to make his 160th Grand Prix start on a 500 this weekend at Motegi. Only Jack Findlay has started more races in the 500 class.

• Italian rider Stefano Perugini is scheduled to make his 100th Grand Prix start this weekend. Perugini joins 17 other current riders who have made 100 or more Grand Prix starts:

1.  Alex Barros 190
2.  Alex Criville 189
3.  Loris Capirossi 166
4.  Noboru Ueda 146
5.  Max Biaggi 145
6.  Jurgen vd Goorbergh 144
7.  Tetsuya Harada 125
8.  Jeremy McWilliams 124
9.  Carlos Checa 116
10. Lucio Cecchinello 113
11. Gianluigi Scalvini 110
12. Haruchika Aoki 109
13. Emilio Alzamora 109
14. Jose Luis Cardoso 106
15. Norick Abe 104
16. Kenny Roberts 103
17. Garry McCoy 102
18. Stefano Perugini 99

• Max Biaggi has now scored points in 23 consecutive races in the 500 class. The last time Biaggi failed to score points was at the French Grand Prix last year when he crashed out while leading the race on lap 4. Only four riders have had longer streaks of consecutive point scoring finishes in the 500 class. The top ten performers, in terms of consecutive point scoring finishes in the 500 class, are below:

LONGEST CONSECUTIVE POINT-SCORING STREAKS (ALL TIME 500 CLASS RECORDS)
1. Mick Doohan 37 (1995/96/97)
2. Wayne Gardner 30 (1986/87/88)
3. Eddie Lawson 28 (1983/84/85)
4. Regis Laconi 24 (1999/2000)
5. Max Biaggi 23 (2000 - ongoing)

• Daijiro Katoh took his eighth win of the season at the Grand Prix of Valencia. In the 250 class only four riders have won more than eight races in a single season including Valentino Rossi and Max Biaggi. With four more races to go before the end of the season Katoh has a chance of setting a new record for most wins in a single season in the 250 class:

NUMBER OF WINS IN THE 250 CLASS IN A SINGLE SEASON
10 wins > Mike Hailwood - 1966
10 wins > Anton Mang - 1981
9 wins  > Max Biaggi - 1996
9 wins  > Valentino Rossi - 1999
8 wins  > Anton Mang - 1987
8 wins  > Luca Cadalora - 1991
8 wins  > Max Biaggi - 1995
8 wins  > Daijiro Katoh - 2001

• The 125 race in Valencia resulted in the first ever all teenage podium in any GP class. The oldest of the three riders and race winner, Manuel Poggiali, was just 18 years and 221 days old on the day of the race. The average age of the three podium finishers was 17 years and 36 weeks, making it easily the youngest ever podium in the 52 year history of GP. The previous youngest podium was the 1996 Dutch TT (Alzamora, Goi and H. Aoki) which had an average age of 19 years and 47 weeks. The youngest podium in the 250 class occurred earlier this year at Donington Park when Daijiro Katoh, Roberto Rolfo and Marco Melandri finished on the podium, with an average age of 21 years and 38 weeks. The youngest ever podium in the 500 class was at the French Grand Prix at Le Mans in 1976 when Barry Sheene won the race followed home by Johnny Cecotto and Marco Lucchinelli, the three podium finishers having an average age of 22 years and 29 weeks.