MOTEGI, Japan \u2013 A major tyre issue has shaken up the Japanese MotoGP Grand Prix weekend at Motegi. Following the severe degradation problems experienced during Saturday\u2019s Sprint, Michelin has officially withdrawn the soft rear tyre from the allocation available to riders for Sunday\u2019s Grand Prix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The drastic decision comes after the 12-lap Sprint placed extreme stress on the French manufacturer\u2019s tyres, with blistering becoming one of the biggest concerns of the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Among the riders affected were World Championship leader Jorge Mart\u00edn and Pecco Bagnaia, with the latter forced to abandon the race and return to the pits just one lap before the chequered flag.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several factors combined to create the problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Motegi\u2019s new high-grip asphalt, track temperatures reaching approximately 40\u00b0C and an exceptionally fast race pace generated extreme stress on the rear tyres.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Sprint was completed around nine seconds faster than the 2025 edition, highlighting the considerable increase in performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The combination resulted in excessive temperatures in the rear tyre shoulder, contributing to the blistering experienced by several riders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With the soft compound removed from the allocation, tyre selection for Sunday\u2019s Japanese Grand Prix has suddenly become one of the most important strategic questions of the weekend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The medium rear remains available, although riders will have to manage it extremely carefully over the full race distance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Michelin, however, is strongly recommending the reinforced-carcass hard compound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There is one major problem: no rider has completed a single lap on that tyre during the weekend so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That leaves teams with very little data ahead of the Grand Prix.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jack Miller warned that using a tyre that nobody has previously tested could effectively turn Sunday\u2019s race into a lottery, a concern also shared by his Yamaha Pramac teammate Toprak Razgatlioglu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The reinforced hard tyre also brings back uncomfortable memories for Ducati.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is the same specification that previously created significant grip problems for the Desmosedici at the Red Bull Ring, raising further questions about how the Italian bikes will perform if teams decide to use it at Motegi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite the tyre concerns, Ducati had plenty to celebrate after Saturday\u2019s Sprint.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Marc M\u00e1rquez remained unaffected by the severe degradation suffered by some of his rivals and claimed victory, moving to within just seven points of championship leader Jorge Mart\u00edn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There will be no changes to Sunday’s race distance, while the Warm-Up remains limited to just ten minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That gives teams an extremely small window in which to gather information on tyre behaviour before making their final decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The choice is therefore likely to come down to two very different options: risk the medium and carefully manage its degradation over the race distance, or switch to the reinforced hard compound despite having virtually no weekend data on its performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the problems seen during the Sprint, tyre management could now become one of the decisive factors in the Japanese Grand Prix.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
MOTEGI, Japan \u2013 A major tyre issue has shaken up the Japanese MotoGP Grand Prix weekend at Motegi. Following the severe degradation problems experienced during Saturday\u2019s Sprint, Michelin has officially withdrawn the soft rear tyre from the allocation available to riders for Sunday\u2019s Grand Prix. The drastic decision comes after the 12-lap Sprint placed extreme […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motogp"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2116"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2116\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2117,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2116\/revisions\/2117"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/giornalemotori.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}