Casey Stoner of Australia riding the Repsol Honda clinched the World Championship for himself and for Honda at the Philip Island circuit in Australia. Stoner took off from the start and stayed at the front of the field till the end even while carnage was happening in the form of riders crashing all over the place, some assisted by a small cloud burst of sorts. It helped Stoner’s case that his title rival Yamaha’s Jorge Lorenzo could not participate in the race due to having hurt his ring finger that necessitated immediate surgery. His teammate Ben Spies who had a scary crash yesterday but went on to compete in the qualifying was declared not fit to race thereby ensuring that both factory Yamahas were absent on the grid. The grid was further reduced when Damian Cudlin who was a replacement for the injured Hector Barbera on the Mappfre Ducati fell in qualifying and ruled himself out of the race. The grid was therefore reduced to a farcical fourteen starters and as the race progressed the size of the grid diminished further with Valentino Rossi crashing out even as he was trying to fight Bautista for fifth place. A little while later Bautista himself crashed. More crashes happened in the form of Cal Crutchlow on the Tech3 Yamaha and Hiroshi Aoyama on the Gresini Honda. All was not lost for Gresini Honda as Marco Simoncelli battled rain and Andrea Dovizioso to take second in the race, his highest finish this season. Dani Pedrosa continued his lacklustre form to finish in fourth place. Colin Edwards on the other Tech3 Yamaha and Randy De Puniet on the Pramac Ducati finished fifth and sixth respectively while Nicky Hayden and Toni Elias took seventh and eighth on the Ducati and LCR Honda. Ninth and tenth place went to Pramac Ducati’s Loris Capirossi and Karel Abraham on the Cardion AB Ducati. Elias and Capirossi finished one lap behind the leader while Karel Abraham who recovered from a crash finished two laps behind.