{"id":572621,"date":"2026-03-29T18:58:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T18:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/572621\/"},"modified":"2026-03-29T18:58:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-29T18:58:12","slug":"joan-mir-had-to-attack-but-misses-out-on-cota-motogp-sprint-podium","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/572621\/","title":{"rendered":"Joan Mir \u201chad to attack\u201d but misses out on COTA MotoGP sprint podium"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"ltr\">Joan Mir was in contention for a top three finish in the COTA MotoGP sprint, before crashing out on the final lap after pushing too hard to catch Pedro Acosta.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Had Mir not pushed quite as hard and accepted fourth, then the factory Honda rider would have ultimately claimed third anyway as Acosta was later given a post-race penalty for a low tyre pressure.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">But Mir was unaware that Acosta might receive a penalty, which is why he pushed to try catch the KTM star.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Mir also said that the crash of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\/racer\/995158\/marco-bezzecchi\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Marco Bezzecchi<\/a>, who was running in second place at the time of his fall, sparked his late push.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI\u2019m very disappointed,\u201d Mir told MotoGP.com. \u201cI have no regrets because it was a day to take risks, especially when Marco [Bezzecchi] crashed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI had the opportunity to finish on the podium. That changed the mentality a bit.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI had to attack in that last lap to try and overtake Pedro [Acosta].\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI didn&#8217;t want to go to bed thinking that I didn\u2019t try. That\u2019s the reality. I made a mistake. It was my fault completely, this time.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/gng_1302699_hires.jpg\"   type=\"image\/jpeg\" alt=\"Joan Mir, 2026 US MotoGP. \" loading=\"lazy\" style=\"aspect-ratio:1.5\"\/> <\/p>\n<p>Joan Mir, 2026 US MotoGP.<\/p>\n<p> \u00a9\u00a0Gold and Goose<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">On the other side of the Honda HRC garage, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.crash.net\/motogp\/racer\/973240\/luca-marini\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Luca Marini<\/a> was one of the major beneficiaries of team-mate Mir and other riders that crashed at the front of the sprint.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">However, the Italian\u2019s race was far from straight forward, as set-up changes prior to the sprint put him on the back foot.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Speaking after the 10-lap sprint, Marini said: \u201cIt was pretty chaotic! I didn\u2019t feel so fast. Compared to Friday I was missing something.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cWe changed the bike a bit in the morning and it was not great. It was not [the] correct [direction] so we went back for the sprint race but I was still not feeling 100%.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI tried to make the best start possible because it\u2019s important to be in front, but to stay with the top three we need to push a lot in [corner] entry, and every braking [zone] and I was struggling.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI made some mistakes but I was lucky that some guys fell down and it helped achieve a fantastic result for us. We have to be happy for this sixth place.\u201d<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p> Article continues below ADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to our MotoGP Newsletter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Joan Mir was in contention for a top three finish in the COTA MotoGP sprint, before crashing out&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":572622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,9398,9399,10732,806,805,803,804,10734,85],"class_list":["post-572621","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-joan-mir","tag-luca-marini","tag-marco-bezzecchi","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-pedro-acosta","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}