Sunday’s Por𒁏tuguese MotoGP once again highlighted just how good the reigning world champi⛄on is. 

Quartararo, who started from fifth, made a brilliant get-away as he slotted into seco💖nd placeꦦ come the end of lap one. 

• MotoGP Rider 🉐Rat꧑ings: Quartararo leads a perfect trio, Miller rock bottom 
• ‘Iꩵ impressed myself’ - how did Quartararo swap distant defeat for runaway win? 
• Keith Huew🍷en: 'Really surprised' no penalty for Jack Miller, Joan Mir incident

Two laps later and P1 was his after getting thro🀅ugh on Mir at turn one. The two champions from 2020 and last season were𝓀 expected to fight it out all race, but after pumping eight tenths into the Suzuki rider in just one lap, a two-way fight quickly became a wish for everyone watching, not a reality. 

Quartararo grew his lead to over six seconds - ꦑeventually won by 5.4 seconds - in what was easily the most dominant performance by any rider this year. 

Shades of 2013-19 Marc Marquez in Quartararo’s performance?

Speaking on the weekly MotoGP pod🍬cast, Grand Prix expert Keith Huewen had very high praise for Quartararo, in fact, he believes the Frenchman is masking big problems at Yamaha to the same extent that Marquez did f🧜or years at Honda.

"I said it on T𝔉witter earlier on in the weekend, basically Fabio Quartarar🌼o is the Marc Marquez of Yamaha," said Huewen. 

"Without Fabio Quartararo Yamaha woul𓆏d be in the deepest doo-doo. They’💎re just not performing in the hands of anyone else. 

"It’s Quartararo who is cutting the mustard every time. Whatever the reason, he manages to make that package work when it’s possible to make it work, just like Marquez used to do with Honda. There wa🧜s no one who could consistently get the results that Marquez could on the Honda; it's pretty much still the same. But Honda are just a little bit at sea at the moment."

While no two circuits are the same which is likely to cause more inconsistent results - not just for Quart🌊araro - but the whole grid, very few can win in the way Quartararo did so at Portimao. 

Going into last weekend Quartararo was responsible for the Japanese manufacturer’s onꦰly podium of the year (Mandalika), which is why Huewen believes Quartararo dug his managing𝓰 director Lin Jarvis out of a ‘big hole’.

Huewen continued: "I mean, what a year! We’ve ha🥂d ten podium finishers which is more than Moto3 and Moto2. Quartararo is good around there (Portimao), and maybe the fact the bike hasn’t changed at all suit💛s the fact that they have no data. 

"They only had one dry session which was t🗹he warm-up session on the Sunday morning which was really cold, everything else had been really miserable, wet, patchy and dodgy. So the fact was, the Yamaha by virtue of not changing much; had the same tyres as last year I think, so data wise they had everything they needed and that was maybe an advantage for them. 

"But what a great ride by Quartararo. On the day wherꦍe his racing managing director (Lin Jarvis) had his 400th race, Quartararo absolutely dug him out of a mas✃sive grey hole. I’ve never seen Lin Jarvis with a bigger grin on his face. 

"His job and the factory’s job must have looked jus🅘t a little bit tenuous over the last few months with the way that they haven’t made any progress, but on his 400th race they get a win from nowhere. Quartararo was imperious and no one could get near him."

Quartararo is ‘grabbing every opportunity’, back on track for MotoGP title?

Quartararo’s win is not just a big achievement given Yama🦹ha’s current issues, it’s a victory that’s also catapulted him to the top of the championship alongside Rins. 

To win back-to-back titles Quartararo will need to ‘grab every opportunity’, which wuqian0821.com’s MotoGP ediꦏtor Peter McLaren believes is already hꦉappening: "I mean the next best Yamaha wasn’t even in the top ten. Dovizioso (11th) was 29 seconds back. 

"It does just show how much Yamaha do need Quartararo. He’s gꦍrabbing every opportunity. We saw him happy with seventh place🍨 in COTA and he was saying ‘I'm doing everything, I’m getting everything I can out of this bike’. 

"This track didn’t have the long straights where the top speed was hurting him and so he was able to do a bit more.🌼"

Download Episode 43 at the following links...