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MotoGP has announced a replacement for the long-in-doubt 2024 opening Kazakhstan Grand Prix, opting to fill its spot with a second race at Misano.

The series will thus face another round of the world’s major motorcycle championship, the World Superbike Championship, organised by Italian MotoGP promoter Dorna.

The first Kazakhstan Grand Prix at the Sokol circuit was originally scheduled for June after the first race of 2023 failed, and was initially postponed to September, to fill a spot suddenly vacated by the Indian Grand Prix.

But a race at Sokol in September also proved unsuitable due to what MotoGP has now attributed to “operational and logistical problems caused by previous flooding throughout the region” – which was deemed responsible for the delay earlier this year.

The MotoGP was understood to have struggled to find a third different race to fill the September 20-22 slot, initially settling on a second race in Qatar as its preferred alternative – but this did not work out.

A second race will now be held in Misano, the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, two weeks after the first San Marino Grand Prix at the same venue. In the weekend between these two races, Misano hosts the Italian Bike Show.

Misano had already held two races in the MotoGP season in 2020 and 2021 as calendars were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

But the new date for the second race at Misano will this time mean a very tight logistical shift as the MotoGP team will race just one week later at the Mandalika circuit in Indonesia.

But more importantly, Misano is also just 250 kilometres from Cremona, which has been added to the WSBK calendar this year and will host its round on the same weekend as the new Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.