Joan Mir hasn’t had a good 2022 MotoGP year. This year’s MotoGP champion has not yet occupied the top spot on the podium. Mir maintained consistency in the first five races, with four top-six finishes despite failing to rank in the top three. After the Spanish Grand Prix in 2022, though, everything changed.
Mir’s season took a dramatic turn when Suzuki notified its Factory team that the company intended to leave the Grand Prix championship after the 2022 season. But, the Suzuki rider has continued to feel the effects of that sucker punch, as five of the last seven rounds have ended in a crash. With a fourth-place finish at the Catalan Grand Prix, he did match his season’s best finishes, but his most recent performance might prevent him from competing in future events.
At Austria’s Red Bull Ring Circuit on Sunday, August 21, 2022, the number 36 was seventh on the starting grid. The former champion maintained a consistent speed throughout the weekend, finishing in third place in the FP3 practice session of the race weekend. Mir moved up one spot when the starting gun went off, but his efforts fell apart at the very first corner.
Fabio Quartararo, the defending champion, and Maverick Vinales, an Aprilia rider, were in front of Mir when his GSX-RR briefly lost rear grip before regaining it. This caused the rider to fly head over heels into the air. Mir took a hard fall and landed in the gravel trap, immediately grasping at his right ankle. Mir was told he had a fractured ankle at his initial check-up at the circuit medical center, but he is thankful his injuries weren’t worse.
“It could have been worse, so I feel relatively lucky, because from the outside it’s pretty scary,” Mir said. “The first diagnosis shows bone fragments and fractures in my ankle. Tomorrow I will undergo further examinations, including an MRI to see if a ligament has not been affected.”