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FEATURE<br />
MotoGP is tight, tense<br />
and pressurised on a<br />
normal day but the<br />
stakes were raised for 2019<br />
thanks to the influx of new<br />
and eager throttle hands.<br />
Fabio Quartararo, Miguel<br />
Oliveira, Pecco Bagnaia and<br />
Joan Mir represented the next<br />
generation of high-class athletes<br />
to hit the elite: two world<br />
champions, all Grand Prix<br />
winners and all graduates of<br />
the steps through Moto3 and<br />
Moto2.<br />
Team Suzuki Ecstar’s Mir<br />
however had a slightly different<br />
trajectory. Less than<br />
eighteen months before he’d<br />
first sampled the power of the<br />
works GSX-RR the Mallorcan<br />
was celebrating the Moto3<br />
World Championship after just<br />
his second campaign in Grand<br />
Prix. Such was his dominance<br />
in 2017 (10 triumphs) and immediate<br />
excellence in Moto2<br />
that the recently-turned 22<br />
year old was quickly identified<br />
by the Suzuki factory as the<br />
hottest talent to snare.<br />
Mir’s ascent has been dizzying<br />
and his arrival among<br />
‘the big boys’ has asked a lot<br />
from what is already a very<br />
focussed and dedicated but<br />
also likeable youngster. In August,<br />
while rounding the quick<br />
Brno circuit in the Czech<br />
Republic for a 2020 test and<br />
mere hours after the Grand<br />
Prix, Mir crashed heavily at<br />
300kmph through Turn 1. He
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