Feeling the pressure at Silverstone MotoGP as new rule introduced

MOTOGP has been testing a new rule for the first part of the 2023 season, but from the next round, the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, running tyres deemed to be under pressure will result in penalties.

A tyre pressure monitoring system has been undergoing testing all season, with the results being fed to Dorna and the stewards for them to analyse the grids' tyre pressures throughout a race weekend. Now though, any riders or teams running their MotoGP bike’s with lower than specified pressures during the Sprint on Saturday, and the Grand Prix on Sunday will be hit with penalties. It’s important to note that this doesn’t apply to Moto2 or Moto3 yet, just the premier class.

For a first infringement where a bike is found to be running lower than specified tyre pressures, there is no penalty, although a warning will be issued. For the second infringement a three-second time penalty will be issued, for the third a six second penalty, and a 12-second penalty will be applied for the fourth infringement. Eventually, there could be disqualifications issued for teams continually breaking the rule, although for now, it will just be time penalties applied.

The reason the system is just being brought in now, and not at the beginning of the season which would make more sense, is down to the teams and manufacturers needing some time to get their heads around the new sensor. All MotoGP teams already used tyre pressure monitoring systems (TPMS), although all involved decided it would be better to use the first part of the season to calibrate the new monitoring system to the one they were all already using.

So, in short, the new hard and fast rule is that tyres must not fall below a specified pressure during the Sprint race on Saturday, and the Grand Prix on Sunday, and we’d expect there to be a number of penalties getting handed down!