Mika Kallio

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Mika Kallio

MotoGP Record
Nationality	Finnish
Nicknames
Bike #	36
Current team	Red Bull KTM
World Championships	0
Race Starts	83
Race Wins	7
Podium finishes	23
Pole positions	12
Fastest laps	4
Championship Points	751
2007 Championship position	20th (0 pts)

Kallio racing with his KTM bike (photograph by Gigi Soldano).

Mika Kallio (born November 8, 1982 in Valkeakoski) is a Finnish Grand Prix motorcycle racer. He started racing in 1997 and won the Finnish championship in road racing with further success in 1999 and 2000. During 2000, he also became the Nordic champion after finishing second in the previous year.

While Kallio persued his road racing goals, the Finn has also scored plenty of success in Ice Racing back home in Finland, having achieved the Finnish motorcycle ice racing championship in 2000, 2004 and 2005 in the 125cc class. At 500cc level, Mika also won 2 championships in this class, 2004 and 2006.

For the 2007 season, Kallio has moved up to MotoGP 250cc and rides alongside Japan's Hiroshi Aoyama for the Red Bull KTM squad after 5 seasons at 125cc level.

In November 2006, Kallio won the Best Finnish Motorsport Driver 2006 award for the second year running. He collected 33.1% of all votes and pipped Enduro world champion Samuli Aro, rally driver Marcus Grönholm and F1 star Kimi Räikkönen.

1 Achievements in MotoGP 125cc
2 2005 Qatar Grand Prix incident
3 Career Statistics
4 External links

[edit] Achievements in MotoGP 125cc

Rookie of the Year in 2002
First podium (2.) at Sepang in 2003
First pole position at Estoril in 2005
First win at Estoril in 2005
Second overall in the world championship (8 poles, 4 wins and 237 points) in 2005
Second overall in the world championship (4 poles, 3 wins and 262 points) in 2006

[edit] 2005 Qatar Grand Prix incident

Kallio lost the championship in 2005 by just five points to Thomas Lüthi. He lost exactly five points, with only three races to go, at the Qatar Grand Prix when his KTM team-mate, Gábor Talmácsi, pulled out from behind the slipstream and passed him on the last few metres of the race to take the win by 0.017 seconds [1]. Kallio had started from pole position and led every lap of the race and wasn't pushing on the home straight anymore, as Talmácsi had been ordered to stay back by the team due to the fact that he wasn't a title contender. After the race, Talmácsi explained that he wasn't aware that it was the last lap of the race. However, this contradicts the way he celebrated the victory right after the finish line, and the fact that the team had put up a "one lap to go" sign for him on the penultimate lap [2]. Team KTM's celebration, instead, quickly turned to amazement when they realized what had happened. Talmácsi still drove for KTM in the last three races, but was fired immediately after the season finale at Valencia. Had he obeyed the team order, Kallio and KTM would've won the championship due to higher number of wins (5 vs. Lüthi's 4).

[edit] Career Statistics

[edit] Road Racing

Finnish Championship 125cc:-

Year: 1997 Position: 2
Year: 1998 Position: 3
Year: 1999 Position: 1
Year: 2000 Position: 1

Nordic Championship 125cc:-

Year: 1999 Position: 2
Year: 2000 Position: 1

European Championship 125cc:-

Year: 2001 Position: 5

[edit] Ice Racing

Finnish Championship 125cc:-

Year: 1997 Position: 2
Year: 1998 Position: 3
Year: 2000 Position: 1
Year: 2004 Position: 1
Year: 2005 Position: 1

Finnish Championship 500cc:-

Year: 2004 Position: 1
Year: 2006 Position: 1

[edit] MotoGP - 125cc Statistics

Year	Team	Position	No. of Races	Points	Victories	Podiums	Pole Positions	Fastest Laps
2001	Ajo Motorsport	-	2	-	-	-	-	-
2002	Ajo Motorsport	11.	16	78	-	-	-	-
2003	Ajo Motorsport / Red Bull KTM	11.	16	88	-	1	-	-
2004	Red Bull KTM	10.	16	86	-	1	-	-
2005	Red Bull KTM	2.	16	237	4	10	8	3
2006	Red Bull KTM	2.	16	262	3	11	4	1
Total of (5 seasons)			82	751	7	23	12	4