Takaaki Nakagami out of Japanese MotoGP after violent FP1 crash
Takaaki Nakagami has been declared unfit and ruled out of the remainder of the Japanese MotoGP following his FP1 crash.
Honda wildcard Takaaki Nakagami has been declared unfit at the Japanese MotoGP following and FP1 crash.
Nakagami’s wildcard at Japan is to be the last one in MotoGP history as one-off entries will be banned in the class from 2027.
For the former Moto2 race winner it was therefore a final chance to race his home grand prix at Motegi, but his weekend has been brought to a halt after less than five minutes on track.
FP1 had started with rain in the air at Motegi and the track was damp in places to begin with. Several riders headed out straight away although many stayed in the pits in the opening minutes.
Nakagami was one to venture out, but he crashed after only four minutes of the session at turn 11. He was behind fellow Honda rider Luca Marini at the time of the crash; Marini was to the outside of the track as Nakagami lost control off-throttle and high-sided.
The Japanese rider was in visible discomfort in the gravel trap as the marshals cleared both rider and bike from the scene, and shortly after HRC communicated via social media that Nakagami had been declared unfit with a left collarbone fracture.
It means Nakagami will take no further part in the weekend and HRC is reduced to its usual complement of four bikes, although Marini’s usual team-mate Joan Mir is replaced by Somkiat Chantra as the Spaniard remains unable to ride through illness.
Mir will also miss next weekend’s Indonesia race, when Chantra will be in Estoril for the WorldSBK race there. It’s likely that Nakagami, having fulfilled his final wildcard in Japan, would’ve been drafted into the Honda HRC Castrol team to replace Mir in Mandalika, but his collarbone fracture now makes that highly unlikely.
Alex joined the Crash.net team in August of 2024 having covered consumer and racing motorcycle news at Visordown for two years.
