Suzuka’s 8 Hours is a lone survivor from a handful of legendary headline events of the past, where the world’s top riders played away from home.
That’s grand prix riders, I mean. Those elevated beings who tend to win, no matter what or where they are riding. But who nowadays, with very rare exceptions, only race at GPs.
Once the Isle of Man was like that. Of necessity, as a world championship round. Riding there was more or less a matter of course for anyone running a serious campaign. Until in 1976 the danger finally saw it dropped from the calendar.
Happily, the TT survived on its own inner strength and character. It remains a unique highlight of the racing year. But you wouldn’t catch a current MotoGP rider anywhere near it.
Once upon a time the Daytona 200 started the international season, with a similar status. Any rider who was anyone took part, the factories likewise. It was a landmark. And it made and broke reputations (and Barry Sheene’s legs). Past winners are a Who’s Who of US racing royalty, including Kenny Roberts (three times) Freddie Spencer, Eddie Lawson, Wayne Rainey and Kevin Schwantz. Plus Europe’s finest, including Giacomo Agostini and Jarno Saarinen.
Then it faded away, even suffering the indignity, for a spell, of being split into two 100-mile legs. It survives today back to full length but as a shadow of its former self, with Supersport bikes rather than yesterday’s proper racers. Again, MotoGP riders? Forget it.
And the Imola 200. The Italian international was once the glittering jewel of European racing. It was the making of Ducati. Now it’s just a memory for the oldies. It last ran in 1985.
Only the 8 Hours remains, and this year, for the second time straight, it was won by a MotoGP star, Johann Zarco, riding for Honda with veteran Takumi Takahashi (the Japanese legend’s seventh win).
Another premier-class winner, Jack Miller, was second, for the Yamaha factory, teamed with WorldSBK rider Andrea Locatelli and local star Katsuyuki Nakasuga. They were the only riders on the same lap as the Honda, just 34.24 seconds behind… an average of just four seconds lost every hour!
It’s impossible to underestimate how gruelling this race is, nor its importance to the Japanese factories. The heat and humidity are punishing enough, the pace likewise – it’s virtually an eight-hour sprint. This year’s top lap times were two seconds inside Valentino Rossi’s 2003 pole, at the last Suzuka MotoGP.
Yet the 8 Hours isn’t what it was, in terms of pulling in top stars. Back in the 1980s and 1990s many senior works riders didn’t have the option. It was written into their factory contracts; a hugely inconvenient four-stroke interruption to their work on their very different 500cc two-strokes. Like it or not, and most didn’t, they had to go anyway.
In this way illustrious names illuminate the list of winners. Among them Mick Doohan, Eddie Lawson, Wayne Rainey and Wayne Gardner (four times!). And even, in 2001, Rossi – although by then attendance had become more a curiosity than a necessity. The race had novelty value, as well as kudos.
It’s no coincidence, however, that this year’s only really big names from world racing, Zarco and Miller – while not exactly there under sufferance – have a different agenda from most other GP riders.
With Jorge Martin off the shopping list, Zarco is striving to be Honda’s number one rider in 2025, whether with the factory team or still with the LCR satellite outfit.
Miller is working to save his MotoGP career. With Toprak Razgatlioglu signed up to join Pramac Yamaha next year, either Jack or teammate Miguel Oliveira will be losing his seat.
Both Zarco and Jack will have significantly burnished their reputations in the boardrooms of Japan.
