Is Maverick Viñales the real deal? That is the question we have all been asking ourselves since the Spanish youngster entered MotoGP. The normal yardstick for measuring ‘specialness’ is how quickly a rider rises to the top after entering each class. Good riders get podiums in their first year of switching, great riders win in their first year. Jorge Lorenzo, Marc Márquez, Dani Pedrosa, Valentino Rossi all won in their maiden attempts after changing categories.

Maverick Viñales ticked all the relevant boxes in his early years in Grand Prix. He won his fourth ever race, an astonishingly mature display in the rain at Le Mans. A year later, when 125s became Moto3, he won again, this time the first outing of the season at Qatar. When he moved up to Moto2 in 2014, he clinched his second outing, in Austin. But he was left empty handed in his first term in MotoGP. He had to wait until his second year to score a podium, and later, his first win.

Was this Viñales hitting his ceiling? Not good enough to win in the premier class? We were left to ponder the elephant in the room: the fact that Viñales had moved to MotoGP with Suzuki on their first year back. Even before they left at the end of 2011, Suzuki had been on a downward spiral. Their last podium had come in 2008, their last win dated from 2007. Was Viñales coming up short, or was it just that Suzuki were not giving him a good enough bike?

We started to get a clearer picture of Viñales’ talent in 2016. The Suzuki GSX-RR was a much more competitive package in ‘16, especially in the second half of the season. The Spanish youngster started to shine. He took his first podium at Le Mans, followed it up with a win at Silverstone, then another brace of podiums at Motegi and Phillip Island. Maybe this kid has what it takes after all.

Amid much speculation of his future plans Maverick Viñales then moved to Yamaha. There are no more excuses. The M1 is a proven winner: it owned six races in 2016, and eleven races and a title in 2015. Viñales has picked up the ball and run with it. In the three tests he has taken part in since joining Yamaha, he has finished as fastest. At Valencia, he was quickest on both days. At the private test in Sepang in November, he was reportedly faster than teammate Valentino Rossi, and Tech 3 rookies Johann Zarco and Jonas Folger by some margin. Then at the first test of 2017 at Sepang, he was fastest on Monday and Wednesday, and quickest overall.

More impressive than Viñales’ speed was his race pace. The Spanish youngster has spent the off-season studying the timesheets of Marc Márquez, trying to figure out the secret to the Repsol Honda rider’s consistency. Viñales spent most of the Sepang test working on race pace with used tyres. GPs are won and lost in the second half of the race, not in the first few laps. Viñales knows he must be quick in the final stages, and has been working on his bike control and smoothness to conserve his tyres and maintain as much of their performance as possible.

He was pretty good at it. Looking at his efforts on Wednesday, the day with the best conditions and when everyone had their bikes fairly well dialled in, Viñales was formidable. Viñales racked up ten laps under the two minute mark. He also racked up a further twenty laps in the two minute bracket. Only Marc Márquez did better, and only the surprisingly consistent Alvaro Bautista got anywhere close.

There are still plenty of questions left unanswered after the first two public tests of the 2017 season. Jorge Lorenzo still has work to do to adapt completely to the Ducati, though the signs are very good that he will. Valentino Rossi has been happy with the progress Yamaha has made, but not especially fast. Then again, it isn’t Sunday, and Rossi always finds a tenth or two come race day. Can Dani Pedrosa finally pose a real threat? Will Andrea Iannone challenge for wins on the Suzuki Viñales left behind?

Whatever the others may or may not have done, it is clear that #25 will be a force to be reckoned with on the Yamaha. He shows every sign of being the real deal. Watching him out on track, he looked perfectly at ease, urging the M1 around the Malaysian circuit with minimal effort. Speaking to the media at the end of each day, he was calm and focused, clear in his explanation and unruffled by any questions thrown his way.

More importantly, there was no sign of deference to Valentino Rossi. The Italian is a formidable teammate, stamping his authority inside the team, and using subtle, soft power to control and intimidate the other side of the garage. Viñales is impervious, wasting few words on Rossi, his focus solely on Marc Márquez. Márquez, after all, is the reigning champion and winner of three out of the last four championships.

Viñales and Márquez found themselves together out on track on the last day of the test. They followed one another for a few laps, passing and sizing each other up. Viñales dismissed the encounter as relatively meaningless. “We were just passing and enjoying,” he told us. “We weren’t learning so much, we were not riding really fast.”

It may not have been in earnest at Sepang, but it was a sign of what is to come. It was a little courtship ritual, two dancers circling each other before battle is joined for real later in the year. Maverick may have singled out Marc, but Marc is also all too painfully aware of Maverick. This has all the makings of a new rivalry in MotoGP. If Maverick Viñales is half as good as testing promises, Márquez vs Viñales could be the clash of the titans for many seasons to come.

Photos by CormacGP