Joining Bautista at Honda was Leon
Haslam, who had a solid but unremarkable
year as Rea’s wingman at the factory KRT
outfit. Replacing Haslam at KRT was Alex
Lowes, who had shown some real flashes
of form at the factory Yamaha team in
2019, but never really strung the results
together the way he’d have liked to.
Toprak Razgat took over Lowes’ seat at
the Pata Yamaha team, joining Michael
Van der Mark who kept his seat after an
impressive 2019. Toprak is clearly a rising
star and Kawasaki’s inability to hold on to
him may come back to haunt them.
In 2018 and ‘19, the Puccetti Racing team
was built around him and he delivered in
spades. Rookie of the Year in 2018 and
race winner in 2019. All the signs were
through pre-season testing, although
Toprak had to adjust his style a little to
work with the Yamaha, he had the ability
to adapt and was running with the fastest
by the time the circus arrived in Australia
for the final test days, followed in rapid
succession by Round 1.
And what of the seat at Aruba.it
factory Ducati vacant from Bautista’s
unexpected move to HRC? Well, that
went to Scott Redding, one of the most
exciting and entertaining riders around
who already had form on the Ducati
having taken out the British Superbike
Championship on one in 2019. Chaz
Davies retained his seat in the