Fiat Yamaha's Valentino Rossi is back in his home country leading the MotoGP championship and looking to earn his third victory in a row, making it his seventh consecutive victory at his home grand prix this weekend at Mugello.

"Everyone knows that Mugello is one of my favourite tracks; I've won there six times in a row and now I want to make it seven.

Rossi's teammate Jorge Lorenzo, who is now second in the standings along with Dani Pedrosa, will of course be traveling to Italy despite his injuries, which the Spaniard said are not still completely healed.

"Obviously we're still not going to be at 100% for Mugello but with every race that passes I'm able to put more weight on the footrests." declares the Spaniard

On his part, champion Casey Stoner is hoping for a trouble-free Italian Grand Prix this weekend following his disappointing race in Le Mans after his Ducati suffered an engine problem caused by a faulty component.

Stoner is now 41 points behind championship leader Valentino Rossi after the first five races of the year.