Ever since Jorge Lorenzo’s #3 engine went up in smoke at Assen, after the Factory Yamaha man was scuttled by Alvaro Bautista in the first corner, MotoGP followers have been asking themselves whether Jorge Lorenzo will make it to the end of the season with the remainder of his allocation, or whether he will have to take a 7th engine and start from pit lane at some point.

As each race goes by, the questions have become more urgent: will this be the race where Lorenzo finally runs out of engines, and hands Dani Pedrosa the advantage in the championship fight?

So how is Jorge Lorenzo doing with his engines? Is he, as many suspect, in imminent danger of losing an engine, and with it potentially his second World Championship? What strategies have his pit crew been using to manage with one engine prematurely withdrawn? And will those strategies be enough to see him through to the race at Valencia?

It seems to have been inevitable now, and what other words could there be to say? Casey Stoner has been head & shoulders above the rest of the MotoGP class, a trait that is not too dissimilar from how Jorge Lorenzo, his rival all season long, won the Championship in 2010. The bike to beat this season, being on the Repsol Honda certainly didn’t hurt Stoner’s chances, but he did more on his factory Honda RC212V than the three other very talented riders who had similar equipment. Congratulations to Casey and his HRC team for a well-deserved 2011 World Championship title.

UPDATE: MotoGP.com.au has some photos of the crash (see above). Check them out here.

Jorge Lorenzo has been deemed unfit to compete in the Australian GP, after injuring his finger during the Warm-Up session at Phillip Island. Encounter a major headshake, Lorenzo hit the ground hard as his Yamaha YZR-M1 rounded the corner onto the front straight. Grasping his left hand afterwards, it has become apparent that Lorenzo has injured his ring finger in the crash.

Early reports state Lorenzo severed the tip of his finger, while reporters outside the Phillip Island Medical Center were briefed that the tip of his finger had been lacerated and split open. Regardless of the extent of Lorenzo’s unfortunate injury, the impact for this weekend is that the still reigning-World Champion will not compete in the Australian GP this week, effectively handing Casey Stoner the 2011 MotoGP Championship if the Australian can finish 6th or better in this afternoon’s race.

MotoGP is coming to Phillip Island this weekend, as the premier motorcycle racing series gets set for the Australian GP. With only three more races left on the 2011 calendar, it is possible that Phillip Island could decide the 2011 MotoGP Championship, and points leader Casey Stoner is keen on winning the title in from of his home crowd. After a bobble at Motegi, Stoner saw Jorge Lorenzo claw back four more points in the Championship, thus leaving some margin for the Spaniard to prolong the Championship run (Lorenzo still has a mathematical chance at winning the Championship, we might add). With that being said though, Stoner is the betting favorite for the title, and could still very well clinch at home in Australia. To do so, one of six outcomes needs to occur.

Some say that defending a World Championship is harder than winning it in the first place. Though much of the MotoGP world may already have assigned the 2011 title to Casey Stoner, reigning champ Jorge Lorenzo is not going down without a fight. After starting the year respectfully deferring to the doomsday combination of Stoner on a factory Honda, and downplaying his chances of successfully defending his title, Lorenzo has quietly notched up eight podium finishes, including three wins, with only a single retirement. His sixth place at Assen he owes to nemesis Marco Simoncelli, but Lorenzo still managed to remount and score valuable points.

With all the attention on HRC’s final bid to win an 800cc title, after being the main proponent in the switch from 990s, Lorenzo’s moments in the spotlight have often focused on his new role: that of man without a prayer. But at Misano (spoiler alert!) he showed a lot of heart, grabbing the win and asserting his position as the one Stoner still has to beat. With help from Dani Pedrosa, who passed Stoner to take second place, Lorenzo now trails by 35 points, with five races to go, and has perhaps more momentum than he’s enjoyed all season.

Of course with the Aragon GP up next, Lorenzo will have to try and forget last year, when Nicky Hayden passed him to take a rare podium, and the race was won by, who else, Casey Stoner. If Stoner could beat the field by 5 seconds on a Ducati, he should be even tougher to beat on the Honda, and Lorenzo will have to dig deep to keep his defense hopes alive.

The weather continued to shine on Brno for the Czech GP (we’ll see if it holds off for Monday’s 1,000 bike test), as the MotoGP riders geared-up for one of the paddock’s favorite circuits on the calendar. With MotoGP dodging a bullet on what’s been a rain-filled season, Dani Pedrosa, Jorge Lorenzo, and Casey Stoner lead the 17 rider grid with their front-row qualifying lap times. While Pedrosa seemed to be uncatchable all week long, Lorenzo and Stoner seemed up to the task of at least being road blocks to the flying Spaniard, and in the process grasp some desperately needed strong finishes for the Championship title.

With precious Championship points on the line, Brno held the possibility for several riders to mount their assault on the leader board, including third-row starter Andrea Dovizioso. For Stoner on the other hand, the Czech GP was an opportunity to put some breathing room between himself and the competition, especially as the Australian considers whether he will forgo the Japanese GP round at Motegi later this October, surely losing position on the Championship in the process. With so much riding on their performance at Brno, MotoGP racing didn’t disappoint in this well-fought race.

Dorna keeps pretty tight controls on what information gets out about its business; but when dealing with public entities, some of those figures are bound to come forth. Such is the case with Motorland Aragon, the Spanish track that recently locked in MotoGP through the 2016 season. The cost of hosting MotoGP for the next six years? €41 million. That figure breaks down into €6 million for the 2011 round, €7 million for the 2012 season and subsequent years as well.

Photo: Yamaha Racing

It didn’t take long after Valentino Rossi’s highside for the speculation to begin as to whom will replace the Italian rider at Fiat-Yamaha, but as MotoMatters is reporting, the MotoGP team is in no rush to replace Rossi on their roster. For the next two races, Fiat-Yamaha will campaign only one bike on the MotoGP grid, leaving Rossi’s bike untouched as a sign of respect to the Champion rider.

The 2010 MotoGP season is officially underway as riders took to he track tonight to qualify for tomorrow’s race. Under the lights, riders enjoyed weather that had noticeably less humidity than at the track’s pre-season testing just three weeks ago. With a bevy of new riders, many were curious to see how these MotoGP rookies would fare in the big show, but it was the usual suspects who took all the spotlight.