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Mir, the 2020 MotoGP world champion, has been out of action since breaking his ankle in a lap one crash at the Austrian Grand Prix in August.

Sitting out the Misano round, Mir attempted to ride at Aragon but withdrew after Saturday and sat out last weekend’s Japanese GP too.

It was thought he would return for this weekend’s Thailand GP, but the recovery of his right ankle is taking longer than expected and he will now aim to be back on his Suzuki at the Australian GP in two weeks’ time. Instead, Suzuki has confirmed Mir will be replaced by ex-Ducati rider Petrucci.

“Needless to say, I’m so happy for the chance to race in Thailand with Team Suzuki Ecstar," Petrucci said. "I want to thank the team for giving me this fantastic opportunity.

"I also want to thank Ducati and my current team management for letting me take this stand-in ride. I’m really curious to jump on the GSX-RR and try it, it looks very fast and we know it’s a winning machine.

"I’m also eager to work with the Suzuki crew, that I’ve known for a long time now and we have a wonderful relationship. I know it won’t be easy, so I’m not putting any expectations on the experience, I just want to enjoy it.

"I’m also excited to be one of the few riders in history jumping from a MotoGP machine to a Dakar bike, a Superbike, then another factory MotoGP bike!”

Petrucci made his MotoGP debut in 2012 and rose from a back-of-the-grid seat at Ioda on a CRT-spec machine to the factory Ducati squad in 2019. The Italian won twice in his tenure with Ducati before moving to Tech3 KTM for 2021.

But a difficult season and desire from KTM to field its own up-and-coming riders in Remy Gardner and Raul Fernandez led to Petrucci losing his place on the MotoGP grid. He remained with KTM for a maiden assault on the Dakar Rally, which yielded a stage win despite carrying injury into the event.

Petrucci had expected to continue with KTM to embark on a full rally raid programme in 2022, but this fell through and the Italian linked up with Ducati again to move to the MotoAmerica Superbike championship. He won five races for the Warhorse Ducati squad aboard a Panigale V4 and took the championship battle down to the wire in his first season.

However, Petrucci came up just 20 points short of champion Jake Gagne on the Yamaha. Petrucci was asked by Suzuki to replace Mir at the San Marino Grand Prix earlier this month, but he elected to focus on his MotoAmerica title battle instead.

Suzuki brought in occasional Moto2 starter Kazuki Watanabe as Mir’s stand-in at Misano, while test rider Takuya Tsuda was upgraded from wildcard status to fill in for Mir last weekend at Motegi.

​​​​​​​Petrucci's outing with Suzuki in Thailand will mark the sixth different chassis he has ridden in his MotoGP career.

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Originally posted by Prefontaine:
Thrilla’ Milla’. Ride of his life. Phenomenal. To do it at Honda’s track and stick it up their ass, oh my.

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The calendar is set to extend well beyond its current run of 20 races after Dorna Sports recently announced plans for a grand prix in India last week.

This followed on from an announcement that it had entered into a memorandum of understanding to bring MotoGP to Saudi Arabia in the next few years.

MotoGP now hopes to race at the new Sokol Circuit near the country of Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty after agreeing a five-year deal with organisers beginning in 2023.

A brief statement from MotoGP read: “The FIM MotoGP World Championship is coming to Kazakhstan!

“2023 marks the start of a new five-year deal that sees MotoGP touch down in a new region of the world as the stunning Sokol International Racetrack joins the calendar.

“Located just outside Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty, Sokol is a brand-new motorsport complex constructed in the heart of Central Asia.

“The region will be a new pitstop for MotoGP as the sport continues to expand around the world, engaging with new markets and fanbases.

“Kazakhstan will also become the 30th country to host a motorcycle Grand Prix since 1949, a perfect landmark number to celebrate the ever-expanding history of the world’s first motorsport World Championship, and Sokol International Racetrack will be the 74th venue to host a premier class Grand Prix.”

A full 2023 calendar is expected to be revealed in due course, with the new season starting on 26 March in Portugal.

The traditional season-opening venue in Qatar had to be moved to later in the year owing to the Losail Circuit receiving a major facilities upgrade.

From next year, MotoGP will have sprint races at every round of the calendar, which will run over half-distance of the main race and take place on Saturdays.

This year’s MotoGP calendar was meant to feature 21 events, but the return of the Finnish Grand Prix had to be cancelled due to the track still not being completed on time.

The circuit has since gone bankrupt and is not likely to feature on the 2023 schedule.

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Series owners Dorna Sports have announced several new-race deals in recent weeks that will swell the calendar to 22 rounds from 2023.

On Friday it was confirmed that the Indian Grand Prix would be added to the schedule for next year, which is thought to have delayed the release of the new calendar owing to the revisions its addition necessitated.

Last week MotoGP also announced a new five-year deal to bring Kazakhstan onto the calendar from 2023 at the Sokol Circuit – though both it and India’s Buddh circuit need to be homologated.

Should both races take place, it will ensure 2023 is MotoGP’s longest season to date.

Swelling the calendar further is the addition of sprint races at every grand prix in 2023, which will mean 42 races across a 21-round season.

As part of the changes to the calendar, one of the biggest omissions is the absence of the Aragon GP, which was thought to be the fifth round of 2023 before India’s deal was confirmed.

The four Spanish races and the Portuguese GP have been signed to deals which means all five of those circuits – Aragon, Jerez, Catalunya, Valencia and Portimao – can be rotated.

The 2023 season will start later than normal on 26 March in Portugal, after the traditional season-opener in Qatar had to be scrapped as the Losail Circuit undergoes major upgrade works in anticipation of Formula 1’s return next year.

MotoGP will then continue to Argentina one week later in a surprising grouping given the logistical hurdles that have been faced with getting freight overseas in 2022.

A two-week gap splits Argentina and Austin, before MotoGP comes back to Europe with the Spanish GP at Jerez on 30 April.

The French GP takes place on 14 May before the first triple-header of the year of Italy, Germany, Netherlands on 11, 18 and 25 June.

The Kazakhstan GP takes the now-axed Finland’s original slot on 9 July before a three-week summer break, with the season resuming on 6 August with the British GP and Austrian GP on 20 August.

With Formula 1 taking Catalunya’s June slot, the Catalan GP is now on 3 September and is back-to-back with the San Marino GP at Misano.

MotoGP has grouped all of its Asia-Pacific flyaways together to ostensibly reduce the series’ carbon footprint.

The Indian GP is slated for 24 September, with the Japanese GP at Motegi the following week on 1 October.

The Indonesian GP has been moved from March to 15 October and starts the second triple-header backed with Australia and Thailand on 22 October and 29 October.

The final three rounds in Malaysia, Qatar and Valencia are also a triple-header, beginning on 12 November and ending on 26 November – the latest a MotoGP season has finished.

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Zarco finished Sunday’s wet Thailand Grand Prix in fourth having piled pressure on Bagnaia in the latter stages for the final podium place.

The Pramac rider was careful in how he approached the battle, given Bagnaia is Ducati’s leading championship hope and is now just two points behind Fabio Quartararo after the Yamaha rider struggled to 17th in Thailand.

Having seen no clean way of overtaking Bagnaia, Zarco backed off to finish fourth.

But Zarco revealed that since the San Marino GP, Ducati has instructed all of its riders to not fight Bagnaia too hard for positions that were not victories or podiums.

“It's clear. [I can be] Incisive on Marc, less incisive on Pecco,” Zarco told Canal+.

“The track really dried out on the last five laps, the last four laps, and it was too late to think about winning. But still... The sooner I manage to pass Pecco, maybe I can try something and get away from [Miguel] Oliveira.

“But as there was really only one line and when we got away the bike slipped, well it was still complicated. Two laps passed, and two laps before the end we saw that the victory was not there.

“So, it was good to play it smart. These are conditions in which I am aiming for victory, because I am comfortable in these conditions.

“I was hoping that it would dry out a bit earlier, because at the beginning with a lot of water it was very complicated, you can't see the rider in front, and so even if you brake late... maybe you can get through, but you don't want to make a disaster either.

“And that's what was tricky in combat. It was a good weekend and a good race, because fourth place in conditions like this is long, it's hard, but it's nice to finish with points, a good place and almost a podium... let's say [I] left to Pecco.

“Since Misano we have some race instructions, difficult to apply when we are not fighting with Pecco, and until now it was not the case.

“But today it was the case, and for a victory Ducati doesn't block anything; for places other than podium, yes we give the advantage to Pecco. But here, in these conditions, it was the victory we had to aim for. Fourth is very good.”

Senior Ducati management was seen going straight to the Pramac garage after the race, with Zarco saying the marque’s general manager Gigi Dall'Igna thought his decision not to force the issue on third place with Bagnaia was “gentlemanly”.

“The championship is missing, I've already missed too many races [to score points], and how can I say... Gigi was very emotional.

“To have left the podium he thought it was very gentlemanly of me. But we saw that I was at ease behind, but as soon as we left this [racing] line it became risky and it would have been a shame to make a big mistake.

“So that's it. I was clearly well received by Ducati, they said a big thank you.”