MotoGP Thailand
- 🏁 MotoGP
- 🎉 Race weekend
- 🎭 Isaan
- 🚇 Buriram
Buriram is not where anyone expects to find a MotoGP round. It is a provincial capital in Isaan, a region most visitors to Thailand never see, and for one weekend a year it hosts one of the best-attended races on the calendar. The Thailand Grand Prix has drawn enormous crowds since it arrived, and it brings a kind of international traffic to the northeast that nothing else does.
The circuit
Chang International Circuit is a modern FIA- and FIM-homologated track built on the edge of Buriram town, part of a sports complex that also includes the football stadium of Buriram United. It is flat, fast and designed for overtaking, which has produced some genuinely good racing.
The circuit hosts other international motorsport through the year, but MotoGP is the weekend that transforms the town.
What the weekend is like
Three days of practice, qualifying and racing, with the main event on Sunday. Around it, Buriram turns the race into a town-wide festival — street markets, stages, food and a great deal of beer. The combination of a world championship event and an Isaan provincial town throwing a party is genuinely unusual and is half the appeal.
The crowd is heavily Thai, with large contingents from Malaysia, Indonesia and across the region, and a smaller European presence following the championship.
When it happens
The Thailand round is set by the MotoGP calendar and has recently opened the season.
| Year | Dates | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 2027 | Late February or early March | Confirmed with the provisional MotoGP calendar |
| 2028 | Late February or early March | — |
The accommodation problem
Buriram is a provincial town with limited hotel stock and a race weekend that fills every room for miles. Accommodation sells out months ahead and prices rise sharply. Book the moment the date is confirmed, or plan to stay in Nakhon Ratchasima or Surin and travel in.
The MotoGP calendar is provisional until fairly late and the Thailand round has moved around the schedule between seasons. Do not book non-refundable flights against a date that has not been finalised.
February and March in Isaan are hot and the grandstands have limited shade. Sun protection matters more than most people plan for.
Getting there
From Bangkok: Direct flights to Buriram (BFV), with extra services added for the race weekend. Book as soon as the date is confirmed — this is a small airport and seats go fast. 1 hr.
From Bangkok: Trains from Krung Thep Aphiwat to Buriram, including overnight services. Slower but far easier to get hold of than flights on race weekend. 6–8 hrs.
From Buriram town: Shuttle buses run to the circuit from town over the race weekend, which is much simpler than driving and parking. 20–30 min.
While you are in Buriram
Most visitors fly in, watch and fly out, which misses the point of being in Isaan. Phanom Rung, an eleventh-century Khmer temple on an extinct volcano about an hour south, is one of the finest Angkor-period sites outside Cambodia and almost empty most days. Muang Tam sits nearby.
Surin is also within reach if your dates happen to align, though its festival is in November.
Tickets and where to sit
Tickets go on sale months ahead and the main grandstands sell out. General admission is far cheaper and lets you move between viewing banks around the circuit, which many people prefer for the practice days.
Three-day passes cost little more than Sunday alone and are better value — Saturday qualifying is often the best session of the weekend.
Buy before you travel. Turning up in Buriram expecting to buy on the gate is not a plan.
Phanom Rung and the Khmer temples
The real reason to be glad you came to Buriram is an hour south of it.
Phanom Rung is an eleventh-century Khmer sanctuary built along the rim of an extinct volcano, approached up a long processional walkway and stone staircase. It is the finest Angkor-period site in Thailand and on most days it is nearly empty. Muang Tam, a few kilometres away, has lotus ponds and naga-edged reservoirs and is worth the second stop.
Both are a short drive from Buriram and turn a race weekend into a genuinely interesting trip.
What it costs
Tickets are modestly priced by international motorsport standards. The expense is accommodation — Buriram's limited hotel stock fills and prices multiply for race weekend.
Staying in Nakhon Ratchasima or Surin and driving in is the usual workaround, and is considerably cheaper even accounting for the car.
Why go
Because it is a top-tier international sporting event in a place that otherwise sees very few foreign visitors, and because the surrounding Khmer ruins make a far more interesting trip than a race weekend usually allows.