Last year Cal Crutchlow’s life was taken over. Yes, there was the emphatic dowsing of Great Britain’s four-decade-long dry stretch for victory in MotoGP thanks to his successes in the Czech Republic and Australia, and there was the subsequent surge in attention that goes with such an achievement. But it was the birth of daughter Willow in August, however, that really inverted Crutchlow and wife Lucy’s world, writes Adam Wheeler.

The significance of this new family addition, when Coventry-born Crutchlow’s vocation involves acute judgement and no shortage of balls-out bravery at an eye-watering 220mph around 18 circuits from Argentina to Australia, was not lost on the couple.

Crutchlow is currently fifth in the 2017 MotoGP championship after three rounds. It was a somewhat unusual scenario among the power, gleam and ego of MotoGP: Crutchlow is one of just two fathers on the grid (nearly half of the 23 riders are in or near their thirties) and the only one who will be spotted with a pushchair in the paddock.

“We wanted kids. And I’m at a point in my career where I could happily ‘sit up’ tomorrow and not have to worry about doing anything for the rest of my life,” the Isle of Man resident and fanatic cyclist states, in between mouthfuls of rice and grilled chicken at Losail, Qatar for the opening chapter of ’17 MotoGP that barrels on to the first European round at Jerez, Spain this weekend.