• Team: Red Bull KTM (factory)
• Bike: RC16
• Wins: 1
• Podiums: 1
• Best Qualifying: 6
• Fastest Lap: 0
• DNFs: 1
• Championship position: 6th

A brilliant, brave ride on slick tyre🌌s, as the leaders pitted for wets in a late-race downpour, saw Brad Binder win this yꩲear's Austrian MotoGP.

It was the clear highlight in an often frustrating second premier-class season for the South African, who finished as the t🐭op KTM in the world championship but celebrated just one podium.

Indeed, without the chaos created by the Red B💫ull꧂ Ring storm, Binder would probably have finished the year without a rostrum.

It's no secret that the RC16 faltered in its first season without te🍒chnical concessions, but the bike did hit 🐎a brief sweet spot with a triple podium run in the hands of team-mate Miguel Oliveira.

The Portuguese scored 65 out of 75 poiꦕnts in the Mugello-Catalunya-Sachsenring events, but Binder couldn't take advantage of what proved the bike's best d🀅ry races, managing only 32 points.

Nonetheless, when Oliveira's results evap🔥orated over the second half of the championship, Binder stepped up as top KTM in the last nine races, consistency taking him to sixth overall (after Marc Marquez's withdraw).

That’s a cl💦ear improvement on last year's eleventh, despite facing some of the circuits for the first ti𝓡me as a MotoGP rider.

Qualifying again proved troublesome with only four top-ten starts, but Binder - who made history with KTM's first MotoGP win at Brno last se🍎ason - did iron-out his rookie errors to take the chequered flag in all but one race.

In conclusion, the slow-burning openin𒅌g half of the season - when Binder finished as top KTM just twice in nine r♐ounds - combined with an absence of Oliveira's occasional dry podium form, means we’ve kept Binder in the same ninth place as on the 2020 countdown.

This time, howeve🐼r, he is the only KTM rider to feature in our top ten.