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It has been a rough start to the 2022 MotoGP season. Qatar started relatively smoothly, but things started going downhill from there.

The Indonesian round at Mandalika barely scraped through, the newly resurfaced track already coming up in the final corner as the new asphalt had not had time to bed in.

Then two broken cargo aircraft suffered technical problems and left part of the freight stranded in Mombasa, Africa on its way to Argentina.

A hastily rescheduled two-day event at the Termas de Rio Honda followed, which came off surprisingly well. Then with a short turnaround getting the freight from Argentina to Texas, there was another problem with cargo planes breaking down, and freight arriving late.

Fortunately for the GP of the Americas at the Circuit of The Americas in Austin, Texas, the delay was merely stressful rather than problematic.

Marc Marquez’s second bout of diplopia, or double vision, inside the space of six months has been resolved favorably. The Repsol Honda team today announced he would make his return in Austin, after being given the go ahead by his doctors.

The news was not a complete surprise. Marquez had posted earlier on Tuesday that he had been at Alcarras, riding a Honda CBR600RR, as a test of his eyesight.

It has been four years since anyone lapped the Circuit of The Americas quite so rapidly. In 2018 and 2019, nobody, not even Marc Marquez, managed to get under the 2’03s.

So it is a testament to how much faster the MotoGP riders are going that two riders managed it on Saturday in Austin. And this, despite the fact that the track has become so much more bumpy in the past couple of years.

So bumpy, in fact, that it appears as if the circuit has been issued an ultimatum: resurfaces the section from the exit of Turn 1 all the way through Turn 10, or MotoGP is not coming back.

Pol Espargaro summed up the complex emotions of almost the entire grid (possibly bar Jack Miller, but more of that later) at the end of an eventful first day of practice at the Circuit of The Americas in Austin, Texas.

“First of all we need to say that it’s super nice to come here to America, to be able to race here,” the Repsol Honda rider said. “Already this is something super good after so long in Europe.”

“And to see the American fans is super nice, they are super excited and it’s nice. Saying that, I think we are in a professional MotoGP championship that, we need a minimum of quality in the tracks, about safety, run off area.”

Then came the ‘but’. “We must say that the track is not at the level of a MotoGP championship, sure. First of all, there are parts where the asphalt is super bad.”

For the first time in two years, MotoGP is headed for a flyaway race which isn’t in Qatar.

After a long period of uncertainty, and facing a certain amount of opposition from inside the Grand Prix paddock, the series is heading to the Circuit of The Americas in Austin, Texas.

After having 12 of the first 14 races all inside the same timezone (give or take an hour), a flyaway race feels like something of a novelty.

The novelty will not be quite as great as hoped for all those traveling to Austin.