‘I am like ice; Valentino is like fire’
LUCA MARINI HAS VIVID MEMORIES OF HIS CHILDHOOD: SITTING AT home watching his big brother win races on television or, even better, flying halfway around the world to witness big bro win world championships.
When he was seven, their mother, Stefania Palma, took him to Australia to watch Valentino Rossi win his most famous world championship: the 2004 MotoGP title, his first with Yamaha. Rossi celebrated that success at Phillip Island carrying Marini on his shoulders. Quite an experience for a little kid.
Next season Rossi and Marini will both be on the MotoGP grid. Like so many aspects of Rossi’s life, it has a hint of the fairy-tale about it.
‘It is something unbelievable,’ says Marini. ‘I have many very nice memories from when I was a kid, watching the races on TV, going to the races as a fan of my brother. I spent many good moments with him, always dreaming about becoming a MotoGP rider. So, yes, next year will be unbelievable.’
Marini was born in August 1997, two weeks before Rossi won his first world title, that year’s 125-cc crown. No surprise that he wanted to be a motorcycle racer from the moment he first saw big brother riding around in circles, pulling wheelies and wooing
