Valentino Rossi and Jorge Lorenzo finished second and third in Sunday's season-ending Valencia Grand Prix, marking the ninth time this season that the Fiat Yamaha team-mates have shared the podium.

In 2009 Yamaha won the Triple Crown of MotoGP titles for the second year running - Rossi taking the Riders' title (his seventh), Fiat Yamaha the Teams' title and Yamaha the Constructors' title.

However, unlike last year, Yamaha finished first and second in the riders' championship, with Lorenzo sealing the runner-up spot in just his second year in MotoGP.

Between them the Italian and Spaniard have taken ten wins from 25 podiums, while Tech 3's Colin Edwards also claimed one rostrum finish, making 2009 Yamaha's most successful year ever in MotoGP.

Fourth at the end of lap one, Rossi re-passed Lorenzo and then overtook Toni Elias to sit second behind Dani Pedrosa by the end of lap four of 30. But The Repsol Honda rider was already several seconds clear and Rossi couldn't get within striking distance of the Spaniard.

"I'm really happy about this result because it was fantastic to be able to ride well at Valencia and it's my best finish here since 2004,” said Rossi. “Of course it would have been better to win but I lost some time at the start battling with Elias and Lorenzo and by that time Pedrosa had gone and at this track it's almost impossible to make up a two second gap.

“It's not one of our best tracks but after the problems we had all weekend we can be very pleased, we made a great modification in warm-up so thanks to all my guys for this. We've ended the championship on the podium and it's been a great season, another world title and the triple crown for Yamaha, I am very proud. Thank you to Yamaha, all my team, Bridgestone and everyone else, now we will have a little party before we start work on the 2010 bike!"

Rossi later collected the 2009 MotoGP World Championship trophy in a Sunday evening FIM presentation at Valencia (pictured).

Lorenzo had been re-passed by Rossi after suffering a near highside early in the race, but regrouped and closed to within three tenths of the #46 at the finish.

"I had some good fights at the start and I was feeling quite strong but then I made a big mistake in the slow corner and I was lucky not to crash, so Valentino got by,” he recalled. “I was in a bit of pain and I took some time to recover, and by then the gap was a bit too big to catch him.