MotoGP has elected to cancel the Australian Grand Prix sprint race due to extreme wind conditions at the Phillip Island on Sunday, which forced the Moto2 race to be shortened.
Series organisers Dorna announced on Friday that it was going to switch the sprint and grand prix encounters around on the schedule to avoid the extreme weather expected to hit the area on Sunday, with Johann Zarco securing a debut premier class win in the thrilling contest.
A further decision was then made on Saturday to move the Sunday action forward by an hour on the timetable to try and get in the Moto3, Moto2 and MotoGP sprint race before the weather was expected to get worse in the afternoon.
While the Moto3 race was able to reach full distance, the intermediate class encounter was red-flagged and ultimately called after running ten of the scheduled 23 laps due to wind levels increasing beyond safe levels.
The decision was made to cancel the MotoGP sprint shortly before its expected start time as the weather forecast failed to show improvement.
The loss of the sprint spells bad news for Pramac Ducati’s Jorge Martin, who was looking to recover some of the points he lost to title rival Francesco Bagnaia after dropping to fifth in the Australian GP as a result of a gamble to run the soft compound rear tyre failing to pay off.
The Spaniard faces a 27-point deficit to recover across the remaining four events of the 2023 campaign, with the next stop on the calendar being the Buriram International Circuit for the Thailand GP next weekend.
