While the 2018 MotoGP World Championship may have been wrapped up by Marc Marquez with three rounds remaining, there is no denying this year may just have been the sport's most competitive.
Five riders took to the top step of the podium across the 18 rounds, with a further six from five of the six manufacturers competing making to the podium alongside them.
This season also saw the closest top 15 in history, with 16 second splitting Marquez from Honda teammate Dani Pedrosa at the end of a thrilling Dutch TT. Three more races from 2018 proved to be the second, third and fourth-closest to 15 margins.
2018 will be remembered as the year Marquez defied injury to sail into the pantheon of MotoGP greats with his fifth world title in six years, while it also saw a tense clash of personalities at Ducati between multiple race winners Jorge Lorenzo and Andrea Dovizioso.
It saw Yamaha struggle for much of it, with just a sole win for the Iwata marque coming courtesy of Maverick Vinales. It was also a historic year, with Cal Crutchlow becoming the first Briton to lead the MotoGP standings since 1979 after his Argentina win, while Pol Espargaro brought KTM its maiden podium and last-minute Tech3 call-up Hafizh Syahrin became Malaysia's first premier class rider.
2018 was a year of stunning racing and outstanding performances from its established runners and its new stars. As a result, singling out just 10 was no easy task.
Bautista brushed off a fairly average start to the 2018 season aboard his GP17 to emerge in the European leg as a consistent top 10 finisher through to the end of the year, with a handful of to fives to boot.
He seized his moment when offered Jorge Lorenzo's GP18 for the Australian Grand Prix, battling in the podium group and finishing a fine fourth. 12th in the standings and second-best customer Ducati were not enough to keep him on the MotoGP grid for next year.
But MotoGP's loss will almost certainly be World Superbike's gain, as he leads Ducati's charge against Kawasaki aboard its new V4R Panigale.
Zarco came into the 2018 season as a dark horse title contender after his sensational debut year in 2017, and he began the campaign on fine form, with two second-place finishes from the first four races.
Pole at home at Le Mans put him in prime position to take a debut win, but a crash early on denied him, and a dip in form followed as he struggled to move past the crushing disappointment of his French Grand Prix tumble.
He would see the podium once more, in Malaysia, but by the second half of the season the two-year-old Yamaha he elected to run this season was beginning to show its age. Top independent in sixth, Zarco begins a new chapter with KTM – as does his Tech3 team – in 2019.
KTM management brushed off its tough sophomore MotoGP campaign as “normal” for such a young team. For Espargaro, it was anything but a straightforward year.
Seven points finishes from the first eight races – including an increasingly frustrating run of four straight 11th-place finishes – hinted at big things in the second half of the season with a vastly updated RC16 coming in Germany.
However, he would be left with a back and collarbone injury after a crash at Brno, ruling him out of three of the next four events and curtailing any hopes significantly adding to his points haul.
A classy ride in treacherous conditions in the finale in Valencia saw him take a maiden MotoGP podium for himself and the team, launching him to 14th in the standings.
Victory in Argentina made Crutchlow the first Briton to lead the premier class standings since the late, great Barry Sheene did so in 1979. However, he was under no illusion this would last, not least with the lack of a carbon fibre swingarm coming his way from HRC.
Nevertheless, he continued to live up to his self-proclaimed second-best Honda rider tag, enjoying consistent top six finishes and a further two podiums late on.
He missed the final three races with a broken leg he suffered in Australia practice, and this denied him top independent honours by 10 points in seventh in the standings.
Vinales' second year in Yamaha colours proved to be a mixed affair, with much of the season blighted by ongoing issues with the M1 and it's problematic engine. One podium from the first seven races relative to teammate Valentino Rossi's four was not the form expected of the rider who won the most for Yamaha the year before.
His form was unpredictable in the second half of the season, with podium performances being followed by wild dips in form as he struggled to find a consistent set-up with the bike and to keep his motivation high. Splitting with loyal Yamaha crew chief Ramon Forcada for next year highlighted Vinales' plight.
Things began to gel late on, and he won convincingly at Phillip Island, ending Yamaha's 25-race drought – the longest in its premier class history. He brought the “worst” two years of his career to an end in fourth in the standings.
A poor run of races at the start of the season sealed Lorenzo's fate, and he will be heading for Honda in 2019. Frustratingly, five races of pain could so easily have been avoided had Ducati granted him the fuel tank modification he needed to back his speed up with the physical endurance he was missing.
Back-to-back wins in Italy and Barcelona as Ducati finally gave him the update he so desired was no coincidence, and he quickly turned the tables within the team in his favour as he emerged as the fastest of the works Bologna pair.
He beat Marc Marquez in Austria for his third and final win of the campaign, and almost certainly would have added to that had injury – first an ankle break at Aragon, before suffering a broken wrist in Thailand – not curtailed the latter part of his season.
Ninth in the standings and 134 points was an unrepresentative way to end his Ducati tenure.
After a difficult 2017 campaign, questions arose as to whether Valentino Rossi would re-sign with Yamaha past this year. He would eventually, despite Yamaha's woes with the M1 continuing into the new year.
Rossi managed the situation better than teammate Vinales in the first half of the season, with five podiums from the first nine races, and he remained in the fight for second in the championship until the latter stages despite failing to reach the podium again after the German GP.
He looked set to end his run without a win, which extended back to the 2017 Dutch TT, in Malaysia. But, having led so convincingly for so long, a late fall denied him this. A crash while in the hunt for victory in Valencia brought his first winless season in Yamaha colours to a "shit" conclusion, though he still managed third in the standings.
Rins' debut season in MotoGP was blighted by injury early on, but at the points he was fully fit he displayed the speed expected of the Moto2 frontrunner.
With teammate Andrea Iannone not emerging as expected Suzuki team leader in 2017, Rins made his intentions plain from the winter, and put himself into podium contention from the first rounds. Crashing from three of the first four rounds, third in Argentina after fighting for the win showed what could be possible if he ironed out the errors, and he did just this.
Four more podiums would follow, as well as consistent top five appearances, elevating him to fifth in the standings and comfortably the top Suzuki rider with Iannone in 10th.
Now de facto team leader at the Hamamatsu marque heading into the 2019 season, and on a bike world champion Marc Marquez's believes is ready to fight for the title, Rins' 2018 proved he will be a potent force next year.
Dovizioso's 2017 championship charge was perhaps the biggest shock of that season. Yet to win a dry MotoGP race and only sealing his second victory – after a seven-year wait – at the end of 2016, Dovizioso managed six across a campaign which saw him go toe-to-toe with Marquez and so very nearly best him.
Heading into 2018, armed with the confidence of finally proving he is a MotoGP frontrunner, and a much-improved Ducati, Dovizioso was many pundit's favourite for title glory this year.
A win in Qatar looked to set the tone, but three crashes in four races between the Spanish and Catalan Grands Prix all but ended his championship hopes there and then.
Dovizioso would win three more times in 2018, and put the Ducati on the podium or close to it at tracks it could never do so in the past. A late-season crash in Japan while chasing Marquez for the win put his runner-up spot under threat, though sealed the place at the penultimate round in Malaysia.
Arguably, without his early season spills, Dovizioso still would not have beaten Marquez to the title. He will need to find something extra within if he is to finally become the bride.
Marquez's fifth title-winning season in six years will have been, for some, an inevitability. He is truly this generation's Kenny Roberts or Mike Hailwood. Nine wins and a 76-point advantage in the standings in the end suggest this was an unadulterated romp for the Honda rider.
In truth, this was his toughest season to date. While Honda was able to improve the bike significantly for this year, and early-season falls for main threat Dovizioso massively boosting his hopes, Marquez was not at 100 percent.
He dislocated his left shoulder early in the year while training, meaning he could not train as he would like. More often than not, his shoulder would come out of its socket during crashes, and by the latter rounds it became on the “limit”. The fact that, in all the races he finished, he was on the podium in all bar two becomes even more astonishing knowing just how much he was suffering with injury.
The statistics tell much of the story, but if there was any doubt remaining regarding Marquez's place amongst the greats of grand prix racing, this year – his toughest, and perhaps his greatest – surely this has now been eradicated?
As well as our top 10, there were a number of riders who shone in one of MotoGP's most competitive seasons and will certainly be ones to watch next year. Pramac pairing Jack Miller and Danilo Petrucci put their customer Ducatis into regular top 10 contention across the campaign.
Petrucci managed to net a podium on his works GP18 at Le Mans, but was unable to add to this and match his tally of four from 2017. Despite this, his performances – and a substantially lower price tag – were enough for Ducati to promote him to the factory team as Lorenzo's replacement.
Miller proved the customer Honda he rode at Marc VDS was to blame for his low-key form in 2017 in the early races of his debut Pramac season – most notably with a pole in drying conditions in Argentina. Steady top 10 appearances left him 13th in the standings and third-best satellite Ducati runner.
Suzuki's Andrea Iannone may not have brought the success to the team his Ducati form in 2016 suggested, but a brace of podiums early in the season and two more in the closings stages helped the marque to its greatest rostrum haul in the MotoGP era. Aprilia will be hoping he can do the same for it next year.
2018 was a banner year for rookies, with 2017 Moto2 champion Franco Morbidelli emerging – perhaps unsurprisingly – as the best of them in 15th overall. Dealing with a difficult year-old RC213V and a Marc VDS team in turmoil, the Rossi protege was able to let his talent shine through with a strong run of points finishes in the second half of the season.
But just four points adrift of him in the standings came fellow rookie Hafizh Syahrin. The Malaysian was chosen to replace the ill Jonas Folger at Tech3, and duly seized his once-in-a-lifetime opportunity by displaying flashes of genuine brilliance, including his ride from last to 10th at his home race at Sepang. Not even a consideration for a MotoGP seat in 2017, Syahrin now heads into 2019 with Tech3 and a factory KTM.
