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Valentino Rossi says he is not putting himself under pressure to clinch the title at this weekend's Japanese Grand Prix.

The Yamaha rider is 87 points ahead of Casey Stoner with just 100 points left to be won in the four races remaining.

Rossi needs to finish in fourth place at Motegi to secure the title regardless of what Stoner does.

The Italian, however, says he is is no hurry to clinch his eighth title and will approach the Japanese race as usual.

"We have had a fantastic run of race and now here we are finally, with a 'match point' for the championship, and in Motegi once again," said Rossi in a team preview.

"In 2005 I was in the same situation but I crashed and had to wait for Malaysia to win the title, and then last year we lost the championship in Japan.

"I really would like to win in Motegi, especially as it's such an important race for Yamaha and it would be a great reward for them for all of the work they have done.

"However, we cannot put too much pressure on ourselves and I will try to treat it like another normal race. We have a good margin of points, but there are still four more races so it is still not over."

Race winner Valentino Rossi reckons that red-flagging the Indianapolis MotoGP event eight laps before the end was absolutely the correct decision.

The race was halted on lap 21 as increasing wind and rain made conditions too dangerous to continue.

At first there were suggestions that it would be restarted, causing leader Rossi and title rival Casey Stoner to lobby Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta to get the race result declared, and eventually the officials deemed that the results could be taken from lap 20.

"When I got in the lead I was a tad quicker in certain spots and I tried to push hard, but an incredible wind started, it began to rain a lot and you couldn't see anything anymore, on the straight there were gusts making the bike uncontrollable," Rossi told Italia1 television.

"I didn't raise my arm up because otherwise they would have said 'he raised it up because he's ahead', but every lap I was hoping to see the red flag and in the end I saw it.

"To win here is incredible. Today I've had plenty of different emotions. At one point I honestly thought we wouldn't race, because when the downpour started the track was impossible to use. I think they've been very good because they cleared all the water that was standing on the track.

"With the same conditions elsewhere we wouldn't have raced, but they had these trucks to remove the water. So from there I started finding my focus again and to prepare for the race.

"The problem then was the wind, it was incredible, inconsistent, with gusts. You couldn't go over the front straight, with beer cans, paper cups, plastic bags going over the track. It was a mess, the artificial grass was coming off."

Rossi's Indianapolis win was his fourth straight victory, and puts him 87 points ahead of Stoner in the championship. He can therefore clinch the 2008 title at Motegi in a fortnight.

"Things are very good for the championship, we have a lot of points," he said. "Today we finished in front and then we'll go to Motegi. We'll see.

"I can't remember when was the last time I won four races in a row. I'm extremely happy, I hadn't won a wet race for a very long time.

"I feel in shape, I'm riding well. We are working hard with the entire team, with Yamaha, and Bridgestone. Even though we have some problems, we always try to solve them calmly and we never give up.

"The advantage is 87 points, I need to leave Motegi with 76 ahead, so I can also finish behind Stoner there. In 2005 I could win the championship in Japan but I crashed and brought (Marco) Melandri down with me, so history isn't very positive. So we need to keep focused and try to do a good race there too, and then we'll see."

The Italian dedicated today's win to his grandfather, who passed away this weekend.

"I've just received the news that my grandfather, who was very sick, has died," Rossi said. "It's a shame, because I would have liked to show him whether I could win the title because he cared for it. But he was very sick, these things happen, he was very old. I'm happy to have a victory to dedicate to him."

MotoGP championship leader Valentino Rossi beat crowd favourite Nicky Hayden to win the inaugural, rain-shortened Indianapolis Grand Prix.

The rain that shortened the 125cc race, and forced a rescheduling of the 250cc round, came back with 16 laps of the 28-lap MotoGP race gone, and caused the red flag to be shown on lap 22.

By then Rossi, who had a major moment with his Fiat Yamaha on lap 17 but managed to save it, had already overtaken Hayden's Repsol Honda on lap 14 and kept edging away from him, after the Kentucky rider took the lead at the end of lap two.

Rossi didn't have the best of starts from pole as he dropped to fourth, with title rival Casey Stoner taking the lead immediately with his Ducati Marlboro and followed by Hayden and Andrea Dovizioso.

In the space of a few corners the JiR Honda rider, who started in seventh, overtook both men ahead, but Hayden was soon back on his tail and from the beginning of third lap he was ahead and chased by Rossi.

Rossi and Hayden exchanged fastest laps for ten consecutive laps, while the rest of the field, led by the Italian's teammate Jorge Lorenzo, dropped back. The Spaniard, however, opened up a wide gap over a fighting trio composed of Stoner, Dovizioso, and Rizla Suzuki wild card Ben Spies.

In the end, the top six positions were classified exactly in that order, which was taken at the end of lap 20.

Sylvain Guintoli finished seventh with his Alice Ducati, ahead of Repsol Honda's Dani Pedrosa, eighth in his racing debut with Bridgestone tyres, Chris Vermeulen's Rizla Suzuki, and Alex de Angelis's Honda Gresini.

Pos  Rider             Bike           Time
1.  Valentino Rossi   Yamaha    (B)  37:20.095
2.  Nicky Hayden      Honda     (M)  +   5.972
3.  Jorge Lorenzo     Yamaha    (M)  +   7.858
4.  Casey Stoner      Ducati    (B)  +  28.162
5.  Andrea Dovizioso  Honda     (M)  +  28.824
6.  Ben Spies         Suzuki    (B)  +  29.645
7.  Sylvain Guintoli  Ducati    (B)  +  36.223
8.  Dani Pedrosa      Honda     (B)  +  37.258
9.  Chris Vermeulen   Suzuki    (B)  +  38.442
10.  Alex de Angelis   Honda     (B)  +  42.437
11.  Anthony West      Kawasaki  (B)  +  47.179
12.  Toni Elias        Ducati    (B)  +  55.962
13.  Randy de Puniet   Honda     (M)  +  57.366
14.  John Hopkins      Kawasaki  (B)  +  58.353
15.  Colin Edwards     Yamaha    (M)  +1:00.613
16.  Loris Capirossi   Suzuki    (B)  +1:05.620
17.  Shinya Nakano     Honda     (B)  +1:05.854
18.  James Toseland    Yamaha    (M)  +1:07.968
19.  Marco Melandri    Ducati    (B)  +1:21.023

Rossi´s Assen post-mortem: `I made a mistake´
Valentino Rossi was left bitterly disappointed after a first lap crash in the A-Style TT Assen

Valentino Rossi, for all his undoubted talents, has never been the best of starters in MotoGP races. Identifying this as an area for improvement, and with the prospect of Assen poleman Casey Stoner making a breakaway at the head of the race, the Fiat Yamaha rider was going all-out in the Netherlands.

Unfortunately for the five-time World Champion, the gamble didn´t quite pay off, as on the opening lap he came unstuck due to a combination of over-exuberance a cold tyre and the tricky first left hander of the race.

`Unfortunately I made a mistake on the first lap, on the first left corner,´ admitted Rossi frankly after the A-Style TT Assen. `I went in too fast with a cold tyre and lost the rear.´

The Italian remounted his M1 and fought his way back to eleventh place after overtaking Marco Melandri and Toni Elias, but the rider taken out in his first lap fall was unable to do so. Rossi extended his apologies to LCR Honda´s Randy de Puniet, holding up his hand for the collision between the two.

`I took De Puniet with me when I crashed, so I have to say sorry to him. It was a bad mistake, because today we improved the setting of the bike and had great pace, and could even have challenged for the win,´ lamented the rider, having conceded the lead in the World Championship to Dani Pedrosa.