Sprint races at this year's MotoGP will be 'very eventful', says Miguel Oliveira ahead of season opener at Portimao

Updated 21/03/2023 at 20:05 GMT

MotoGP returns on March 24 for the 75th top class FIM Road Racing World Championship season. A new sprint format has been introduced for the upcoming campaign, and Miguel Oliveira believes the sprint races will be "very eventful" as he prepares to compete in his native Portugal this weekend. Every session of MotoGP, Moto2 and Moto3 will be live and exclusive on BT Sport.

Miguel Oliveira of Portugal and Cryptodata RNF MotoGP Team smiles in box during the Portimao MotoGP Official Test at Portimao Circuit on March 12, 2023 in Portimao, Portugal.

Image credit: Getty Images

Miguel Oliveira believes the sprint races at this year’s MotoGP will be “very eventful” as he prepares to compete in his native Portugal this weekend.

From this season, there will be sprint races on the Saturday of all 21 Grand Prix events, which will play a major role in the title race.

The sprint races will take place at 15:00 local time on the Saturday of every MotoGP event.

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The grid for both the sprint and the main race will be dictated by qualifying. Therefore, if you qualify fifth, you will start fifth for both races.

Only the top nine riders will score points for the sprint with the winner taking 12 championship points, second place will have nine points, third place seven points, before dropping in increments of one point down to ninth.

Oliveria is looking forward to getting his first taste of sprint racing in Portimao – an event which will be shown live on BT Sport.

"I have to wait and see," Oliveira told Crash.net when asked what will be the biggest challenge of the new Sprint race format.

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"I have thought about it many times and I have changed my mind many times.

"Now, I’m of the thinking that whoever is in the top 10 will fight harder to get an extra point, but those who are maybe not close to the top 10 will not invest too much energy. They may prepare the race even better for Sunday.

"But it’s too risky to say something now. We have to go for the first Sprint race and see what is really there. I’m sure the first Sprint race of the season will be very eventful because everyone is very excited to get started.

"To get started with only 12 laps will be interesting. There will be a lot of action. I think it will be challenging mentally because we cannot fail as much. Before we had to do 25/26 laps without fail and now we have to do 36/37 laps in a weekend that must be perfect."