PHILLIP ISLAND: Valentino Rossi rolled back the years to win his sixth Australian MotoGP on Sunday after world champion Marc Marquez’s cruise to a pole-to-flag victory was ended suddenly by a crash on lap 18.

With a second successive MotoGP world title secured in Japan last week, 21-year-old Honda rider Marquez looked destined to match Mick Doohan’s record of 12 race wins in a single season when he led by four seconds.

Ten laps from the end, though, his front end was just snatched away from under him and he slithered along the asphalt and onto the trackside grass.

Rossi, one of the sport’s greats with nine world championships across all classes, then swept to the front to beat home team-mate Jorge Lorenzo and Britain’s Bradley Smith in an all-Yamaha podium and claim his first win in Australia since 2005.

Another British rider, Cal Crutchlow, was in line for second place before he crashed out on the final lap. Crutchlow was one of nine forced retirements, including Marquez, Dani Pedrosa, Aleix Espargaro and Pol Espargaro.

Marquez’s Spanish Repsol Honda team-mate Pedrosa retired from the race on lap seven after his bike was hit in the rear by Andrea Iannone, resulting in a buckled rear wheel rim.

“I knew I had to start behind but I knew I had quite good pace,” said the 35-year-old Rossi. “On the second corner I saw Marc and Jorge in front and I was still sixth — I thought ‘this will be hard’. But after I was able to overtake it was fine.”

The win gave Rossi control for second place in the championship — he now leads Lorenzo by eight points with two races remaining in Sepang, Malaysia next weekend and at Valencia, Spain on Nov. 9.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2014