Jett Lawrence has to some extent been living in the shadow of his older brother, Hunter Lawrence, who was already being tipped at the start of the 2018 season as a contender for the world title in the MX2 class. But 15-year-old Jett is seen by insiders in the motocross world as a veritable rough diamond and is rated even more highly by some pundits than his successful brother.

The fact is that the younger of the two Lawrence boys is not at all overawed by the competition and is one of the youngest riders to contest this year's EMX250 European Championship. Because the line-up for the series generally consists of young adults with several seasons behind them, it might appear at first glance that Jett would be at a disadvantage, not least because of his shorter stature. But the unfailingly good-humoured teenager doesn’t allow that to impede his progress, as he recently showed with a P7 finish in Latvia. He could theoretically still compete in the ADAC MX Junior Cup 85, but he prefers to look for the next logical challenge and has gone straight into the highly competitive ADAC MX Youngster Cup. It was by no means a premature move, as was demonstrated by Jett's maiden victory in the second round of the championship at Mölln.

"For me, it was a completely natural to go into motocross," says Jett with a laugh. "Hunter showed me how it's done, and I followed in his footsteps." His father, Darren Lawrence, nods in agreement. Indeed, he sees the circumstances as advantageous to his younger son: "In our family, nobody had a history of motocross; we started out as complete newcomers. There was never any plan or intention of bringing our boys into this sport; the initiative came from Hunter. He got the idea at the age of seven, because he had been watching supercross racing from the USA on TV. In his first race, he was last across the line, because he pulled up every time someone fell in front of him. Jett, on the other hand, has been able to learn a lot by watching his brother in action. When he started out in the sport, we already had some experience that he was able to draw on."

At the age of eleven, Hunter was already so advanced that the Australian Federation paid for him to enter the Junior World Cup. Some of the people there recognised the talent of the young Australian, and Ben Townley eventually arranged for Hunter to sign a contract with CLS Kawasaki in Europe at the age of 15. “For us as a family, going our separate ways was never an option,” explains Darren Hunter. “So we sold up in Australia and came to Europe together.” At the time, Jett was just tagging along, but his talent did not go unnoticed. This year, he is the only member of the Suzuki Deutschland squad to compete in both the EMX250 European Championship and the ADAC MX Youngster Cup. Meanwhile, his brother Hunter is riding a Honda in the MX2 World Championship and in the ADAC MX Masters.

"I've always hated not winning," says Jett with a grin when asked about his approach to the sport. "I remember well one of my first races where I wept bitterly at the finish, because I wasn’t at the front." Although those times are long gone, they may help to explain the success of the young Australian. Ambition in combination with great talent is generally a recipe for great success. Whether this is also the case with Jett Lawrence, we will find out in the course of the next few years.