We have a situation at C&P GHQ. Two colleagues have just been dropped at Dubai International Airport, and one of them has forgotten his passport. We have less than an hour to find it and make the 35km trip to deliver it before their flight takes off.

Only after the office has been turned upside down do we find the rogue document, and soon I’m sprinting down the stairs to the Management Fleet Toyota Yaris idling outside.

It’s nippy, it’s agile and takes heavy right-pedal beatings squarely on its remodeled chin. We even wheel-spin our way out of the parking lot, though that’s probably more to do with the fresh layer of dust from a weekend of high winds.

There’s heavy traffic on the highway, so I stick to the back roads for the opening leg. Yaris terrain. Quick steering flicks make sure teeth-grittingly late lane changes by other drivers don’t connect, several brake tests doing likewise.