Joan Mir: "2020 a completely different MotoGP" - Exclusive

Much has changed in the four years since Joan Mir won the 2020 MotoGP title for Suzuki.

The first is that Suzuki is no longer a part of the sport, bolting at the end of 2022 and sending Mir to Repsol Honda.

But the championship format itself is also dramatically different.

Mir won Suzuki’s first title in over twenty years with 171 points from a special Covid-shortened 14-round calendar.

Meanwhile, Jorge Martin clinched last year’s title with 508 points from a season of 20 rounds and 40 races, with the addition of Saturday Sprints.

Competing in only his second premier-class season, Mir entered his title year on the back of a best finish of fifth as a rookie, after a mid-season lung injury.

2020 then started badly with retirements in two of the opening three rounds, leaving Mir just 14th in the world championship.

The turnaround began next time in Austria when Mir took his first MotoGP rostrum with second place.

“I remember in the first part of 2020, I crashed twice in the early rounds. But once I was on the podium in Austria, I knew I could do it again,” Mir told Crash.net.

“Because once you reach something once, if you do things in the same way, you know you can do it again.”

A week later at the repeat Red Bull Ring event, Mir led by a comfortable 2.4s when the Styrian GP was red-flagged after 16 laps. He finished fourth in the restart, just 0.641s from winner Miguel Oliveira.

Mir and Suzuki ground down their rivals by finishing on the podium at six of the next seven events, the exception a wet Le Mans race (11th), snatching the title lead from Fabio Quartararo at round ten in Aragon.

Although Quartararo celebrated three race wins, they were his only podiums and Petronas team-mate Franco Morbidelli eventually emerged as title runner-up.

“We didn't have the best bike on the grid at that time. Speed wasn't our strength," Mir explained. "But as a rider, I knew if I did not make any more mistakes until the end of the year, I would be fighting for the title.

“And this is what I did. Not making mistakes. Because we didn't have the luck that nowadays [in 2024] Pecco and Martin have, a superior bike than the rest and on a bad day you can make fourth place.”

Mir took his first and so far only MotoGP victory at Valencia a weekend before wrapping up the title in the penultimate round of the season.

He was one of nine different race winners that year, a high point in the ‘MotoGP’ era matched only by 2016 (but over 18 rounds).

Four brands took GP wins in 2020 (Yamaha 7, KTM 3, Suzuki 2, and Ducati 2). Each also had at least one rider in the final world championship top five.

Five manufacturers were on the podium, with rookie Alex Marquez handing Honda a pair of rostrums in a season remembered for brother Marc’s arm injury. Only Aprilia was left without silverware.

Just five riders won Grand Prix races during the 2024 season, with 11 victories by title runner-up Francesco Bagnaia, 3 for Martin, 3 for Marc Marquez, 2 for Enea Bastianini and 1 for Maverick Vinales.

The Desmosedici GP24 won 16 races with only Mir’s former team-mate Marquez victorious on the GP23. Aprilia's Vinales was the only non-Ducati GP winner.

Regarding Sprints, the score was 17 wins for Ducati and the other 3 for Aprilia.

“At that time [2020], there were a lot of different winners and more equality between bikes. A completely different MotoGP, let's say,” Mir reflected.

“You couldn't make mistakes to fight for the title and I was the one that made less mistakes. So that's why I was able to do it.

“The [2024] title [was] between Pecco and Martin. Maybe Marc or Bastianini [had an outside chance]. 

"But the truth is that the championship [was] between two guys on the 2024 Ducati, which is above every other bike at the moment.

“So in the end, it’s a completely different story.”

Pramac rider Martin clinched the first title by an Independent rider last season courtesy of three GP wins, seven Sprint victories, 16 GP podiums, two GP DNFs and two Sprint non-scores.

Bagnaia beat Martin by 33 points on Sundays alone but lost the title due to a 43-point deficit to the Spaniard over the Sprint season, when he suffered five of his eight DNFs.

Ducati riders filled the top four in the world championship with Martin, Bagnaia, Marquez and Bastianini. KTM's Brad Binder was next best, but with less than half of Martin's points (217 vs 508).

The top eleven riders in 2020, down to then race-winning rookie Binder (87 points), scored over half of Mir's title-winning tally.

Different race winners per season in the MotoGP era:

2024: 5 (Bagnaia, Martin, M.Marquez, Bastianini, Vinales).
2023: 8 (Bagnaia, Martin, Bezzecchi, A.Espargaro, Zarco, di Giannantonio, Bastianini, Rins).
2022: 7 (Bagnaia, Bastianini, Quartararo, Rins, Oliveira, A.Espargaro, Miller).
2021: 8 (Quartararo, Bagnaia, M.Marquez, Miller, Binder, Martin, Vinales, Oliveira).
2020: 9/14 rounds (Quartararo 3, Morbidelli 3, Oliveira 2, Mir 1, Rins 1, Vinales 1, Dovizioso 1, Binder 1, Petrucci 1).
2019: 5 (M.Marquez, Dovizioso, Vinales, Rins, Petrucci).
2018: 5 (M.Marquez, Dovizioso, Lorenzo, Vinales, Crutchlow).
2017: 5 (M.Marquez, Dovizioso, Vinales, Pedrosa, Rossi).
2016: 9/18 rounds (M.Marquez, Lorenzo, Rossi, Crutchlow, Vinales, Dovizioso, Pedrosa, Iannone, Miller).
2015: 4 (Lorenzo, M.Marquez, Rossi, Pedrosa)
2014: 4 (M.Marquez, Rossi, Lorenzo, Pedrosa)
2013: 4 (Lorenzo, M.Marquez, Pedrosa, Rossi)
2012: 3 (Pedrosa, Lorenzo, Stoner)
800cc:
2011: 4 (Stoner, Lorenzo, Pedrosa, Spies)
2010: 4 (Lorenzo, Pedrosa, Stoner, Rossi)
2009: 5 (Rossi, Lorenzo, Stoner, Pedrosa, Dovizioso)
2008: 4 (Rossi, Stoner, Pedrosa, Lorenzo)
2007: 5 (Stoner, Rossi, Pedrosa, Vermeulen, Capirossi)
990cc:
2006: 7 (Rossi, Capirossi, Melandri, Hayden, Pedrosa, Elias, Bayliss)
2005: 5 (Rossi, Melandri, Capirossi, Hayden, Barros)
2004: 4 (Rossi, Gibernau, Tamada, Biaggi)
2003: 4 (Rossi, Gibernau, Biaggi, Capirossi)
2002: 4 (Rossi, Biaggi, Barros, Ukawa)