Lorenzo is flying high after enjoying an incredible seven wins from ten races so far this season. The 23-year-old has a championship lead of 77 points over Dani Pedrosa and the Mallorcan knows he simply has to continue in the same consistent way to ensure a first premier-class championship later this year. After another comfortable win last time out in Brno and a useful one-day test afterwards he is feeling confident of another good result in Indiana. He has a good record with the track having taken a commanding win there last year and his first ever wet podium in 2008, the first year that MotoGP visited Indianapolis.

Rossi's injury-hit season suffered a low point in Brno when he could only finish fifth after being hopeful of something much better, but he and his team worked hard to understand what had gone wrong during the test and they are satisfied that they won't see a repeat this week. The reigning World Champion always enjoys racing in America and he was thrilled to take a brilliant podium in Laguna Seca last month, at just his second race back after breaking his leg. Rossi took a memorable win at the Inaugural Indianapolis Grand Prix in 2008, when the race was battered by Hurricane Ike, but last year he slid out when sparring with his team-mate, something he will be looking to make up for this time around.

With 257,000 permanent seats the Indianapolis Motor Speedway is the largest spectator sporting facility in the world and fills to capacity for its flagship events, the Indy 500 and Allstate 400 car races. Originally constructed in 1909 with a 2.5-mile oval, an exciting 16-turn motorcycle road circuit, which includes part of the historic oval, was purpose-built for MotoGP.