UPDATED: Buriram bows out for 2021 as Thailand postpones MotoGP contract?

UPDATE (February 3): Dorna CEO Carmelo Ezpeleta has told Thomas Baujard of Moto Journal: "There was a communication error: The 2021 Thailand GP remains in place."

It appears the Thai government plans to move the contract for the cancelled 2020 event over to 2021, and delay the start of the new five-year MotoGP contract from 2021 to 2022.

However with vaccinations yet to start in Thailand, and a strict 14-day quarantine in place for all arrivals (who must stay in government-approved quarantine hotels), the 2021 race remains far from certain at this stage...

Thailand looks to have become the first race to drop off the provisional 2021 schedule after the government opted to postpone the start of Buriram's next five-year MotoGP contract, due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.

Instead of running from 2021-2025, the Bangkok Post reports that the MotoGP contract has been 'switched' to 2022-2026. The license fee will remain unchanged at 900 million baht (25 million euros) for the five-year period.

Dorna, which is yet to officially confirm the postponement, is said to have 'reiterated the company's commitment to the event'.

After joining the MotoGP calendar in 2018, the 2019 Thai round saw the highest spectator attendance of the season with 226,655 weekend fans, bringing in a total of '3.45 billion baht' (95 million euros). Last year's round, like all the non-European events, was cancelled.

Although Thailand is the first event named on the 2021 provisional calendar set to rule out a race this year, Argentina and Texas are also highly unlikely to go ahead after both being postponed to an unspecified date later in the year. Brno, which was not included on the provisional canendar, but did have a date reserved pending resurfacing, has said it will not host world championship races this year.

As in 2020, the fate of the flyaway races (with the exception of Qatar) is thought to be dependent on allowing the attendance of fans, for financial reasons.

This year's Thai MotoGP is due to take place on October 10.