'Very Strange' Crash Adds to Joan Mir's DNF-Ridden 2026 Season

A Joan Mir crash is far from an oddity in MotoGP this season, or indeed for the last few years since he joined Honda, but he feels his fall from the British Grand Prix at Silverstone was “very strange”.

Mir’s crash on Sunday resulted in an eighth non-finish from 12 MotoGP grands prix in 2026. Coming on lap one, it meant Mir was never able to show really what he could achieve in the race, and it also made Alex Rins a victim, the Yamaha rider going down when he hit Mir’s fallen Honda.

Honda HRC's Mir said afterwards that the turn seven crash happened when he had contact twice. “I don’t know,” Joan Mir said when asked what happened to cause him to crash in the race. “I didn’t see the TV, the [replay]. It was strange, very strange. I feel a hit from the back and then another one in the front, and then I spin and I crash.”

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There was no blame to be attributed, though, Mir added. “Anyway, I don't blame anyone because I think it was the situation with a bit of chaos at the beginning. I was trying to keep a bit of calm because that medium tyre, [...] we have to be a bit careful, especially in the first two laps. It was a bad luck, honestly.”

Even if he hadn’t crashed, Mir was pessimistic about how the race might have unfolded for him. “From what I see also with this tyre, I think, in terms of performance, it's not very good,” he said. “Yesterday I think that I could defend more in the Sprint, but this race was probably going to be hard for us.”

Mir now sits 18th in the riders’ standings having finished only four races, with only one of those – his fifth place in Czechia – seeing the 2020 MotoGP champion inside the top-10.