P122
CN
III IN THE PADDOCK
BY MICHAEL SCOTT
W
hat is the collective
noun for trumpets? It is
a "flourish."
But there's a new one this
year, spawned by our own dear
world championships. A gridful.
From the first race of the year at
Qatar, the Triumphs have joined
the Moto2 party, with all the thrill
of a big brass band.
This has the portents of an
important moment. Moto2 is
the middle class of grand prix
racing, and should be a rung on
the ladder towards the premier
class.
That is how it used to be back
in the days of ring-a-ding two-
strokes. They were double the
size and cylinder numbers of the
starter 125 class, and half ditto
the premier 500 class.
But with the 500s gone to Mo-
toGP, and the 125s themselves
doomed in the near future, the
quarter-liters were consigned to
the smokey annals of history at
the end of 2009.
At the same time, the halfway
house status was abandoned.
Instead of doubled-up Moto3
250s, or bisected MotoGP
1000s, and in the wake of the
world financial melt-down, Dorna
instead opted for cost-saving.
The middle class would use
A GRIDFUL OF TRUMPETS
A new era of Moto2 has begun.