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On July 2nd, Honda bid farewell to Joan Mir with a social media post, ahead of his move to Gresini for the 2027 MotoGP season, ending his four-year tenure with the Japanese manufacturer. In their post, Honda wrote: “Three podiums and your champion's spirit shine as the brightest moments.”
However, a quick check of the championship statistics reveals that Mir only secured two podiums with Honda – in Japan and Malaysia last year. Despite this, the Mallorcan rider also finished second in this year's Catalan Grand Prix, only to be classified 13th in the official results. What exactly happened?
More than an hour after the podium celebrations, race stewards announced that Mir had violated the tire pressure rule, imposing a severe penalty. A similar incident occurred last year with Maverick Viñales, who finished second in Qatar but was stripped of his podium finish over an hour later for the same reason.
In both instances, these situations tarnished the championship's image and, judging by Honda's post, are not particularly popular with teams, and even less so with riders and fans.
Since its introduction in 2023, MotoGP's tire pressure rule has been a constant source of controversy. With a change in tire supplier slated for 2027, many expected Pirelli to scrap the regulation – a rumor the Italian manufacturer has now denied.
“We have always said we would keep it. I don't know where the opposite claim came from,” explained Giorgio Barbier, Pirelli's Motorcycle Racing Director, in an exclusive interview with motorsport.com. “We must have great respect for the current MotoGP supplier (Michelin). If, after 11 years, they have established a rule, together with Dorna, because they believe that riding with low pressure can pose a danger, I cannot say that such a danger does not exist. Because I don't yet know MotoGP motorcycles in depth. Where does this front tire overheating come from? Probably from aerodynamics, from carbon discs, from several bikes running in the slipstream with aerodynamics that heat the front tire of the rider behind a lot. And this is a condition I don't have in Superbike. Nor is it a situation I can test in Moto2,” he added, referring to Pirelli's role as supplier for both championships. “So I cannot claim that Pirelli will not have this problem at all.”
The rule mandates riders to maintain front tire pressure above 1.80 bar (1.68 for the rear) for 60% of the laps in main races and 30% in sprint races, with penalties for non-compliance being 16 and 8 seconds respectively.
“Clearly, we have a different construction, different materials, different operating pressures. I don't believe a Pirelli tire works better at 1.4 than at 2.0 bar. So we probably won't have that type of problem,” Barbier stated. “But if we link it to what the correct pressures are for Pirelli, we will have to see if it becomes a problem when it drops below that range. So for now, we will keep the regulation, hoping we don't have to apply it. Then we will decide whether to modify it or remove it. There's one thing I see: the current supplier has a very significant sensitivity to pressure changes. If a certain level is exceeded, there is a high risk,” he added.
“With our tires, we have a fairly wide operating pressure window. The manufacturer can choose. The tire's behavior doesn't change too much between one pressure and another,” Barbier concluded, acknowledging that the negative image of seeing a rider removed from the podium an hour after the race is something that “we cannot continue to see.”
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