Fiat Yamaha riders Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo head to Europe’s Atlantic coast this weekend as they look to build on a positive start to the season with another bountiful points-haul at Estoril. 

The eleventh edition of the Grand Prix of Portugal is the third round of the 2008 MotoGP World Championship and is an event that has seen contrasting fortunes for the Italian and the Spaniard in the past.

Rossi is the most successful rider in Grand Prix history at Estoril, having finished on the podium on each of his eight visits to the circuit, including five race victories. The 29-year-old hopes to round that figure up to a half dozen on Sunday as he targets a repeat of his hard-fought victory at the circuit last October. That win was Rossi’s most recent, making for a six-race run without an appearance on the top step of the podium – his longest since his debut win in 2000. 

The Doctor said: "Estoril last year was a great race; it was a fantastically close battle with Pedrosa and one of the high points of the season for us. It's also the last time I won a race and I hope that this is something we can repeat again this time! 

"Jerez was a very important race for us, second place in just our second race with Bridgestone and following the difficult result in Qatar it was very important, plus it gave confidence to everyone involved that our package is really coming together. Our bike was very strong and our tyres worked well until the end, then on Monday we had a test and were able to make some more important steps forward with Bridgestone. 

"We have been working step by step but everyone is very focused and motivated and confidence is running high. Hopefully we are now ready to fight for the win! Portugal is usually a good track for us and I've had a lot of very good races there, especially with Yamaha. It's a different time of year to when we raced there last year so the conditions might be a little different, but I think that we're going to be ready for anything!"