MotoGP: top class under threat as Moto2 steals the glory

MotoGP is fantastic - when it's good. But it can be undeniably tedious as bikes spread out around the track. Mugello is one of the better circuits for keeping riders bunched up - but that means that by half-way through, anyone breaking free of one pack is a long way behind the next pack.

But in Moto2, with swarms of evenly matched engines in frames with different characteristics, the emphasis is on cornering, power delivery and riding skill. And those things - it turns out - are what makes motor racing exciting.

Bradley Smith has an unusual line: he somehow manages to stay off the kerbs (mostly) and in doing so punishes the sidewalls of his tyres less. So he has more grip at the end of the race than some other riders. It has taken him a few races to find his feet but the Spanish GP was the third race in row that the teenager has been on the podium - and his first in the dry.

It's that word "teenager" that raises the flags for the sport for Moto2 is where, seemingly about a third of the MotoGP riders of two or three seasons ago are how hanging out (another third are in World Superbikes). They are no less hungry for success, they have experience in buckets and they are not viewing Moto2 as a fall-back position: the the likes of De Angelis, Moto2 is a premier class. MotoGP has become an exhibition class full of seriously beautiful machinery that is amongst the most photogenic ever made and, with shots of the bike at impossible angles, turns even moderately interested people into breathless idiots.

The Assen race was a MotoGP tour de force. The Mugello race, except for Rossi's dash through the field from near the back - no doubt boosted by his loyal fans - was a masterly display of fabulous riding technique - but not a lot of racing.

Moto2, however, saw a pack of two dozen snarling, snapping terriers screaming around the track, swapping places hunting down anyone who tried to make a break.

Perhaps it was in part the characteristics of the circuit - for a bike, Mugello is basically a series of mostly long straights or easy curves punctuated with the odd hairpin or chicane. In fact, its the changes in elevation that make it the wonderful track that it is.

New tarmac meant unpredictable tyre wear but much more predictable handling, especially under braking.That meant less crashes and that's a good thing.

It also meant that, if someone got into position to overtake, that staying wide and cutting in late would allow a rider to dive inside a rider taking a more conventional - tucked into the kerb on entry - line.

It's just a shame that there are so few bikes in MotoGP. Double the number on the grid and we would see some amazing racing.

Just like in Moto2