Most likely not. Everyone has their own strategy for playing the game.  I play maps with two AI opponents and 80-90 planets, those take 7-10 hours.

I play defensively. I add a lot of defenses to my planets, build starbases, and work hard at completing research fast, usually at the expense of a large fleet.  I rely heavily on diplomacy and cease fires to keep the AI off my back until after I am 50% with all reasearch, and have a strong economy.  Because of this I take much longer in games.

I seen people do the excate opposite, where they try to launch an all-out offensive against their opponents as early as possible, with the intent to catch them before they have any defensive capabilities.  Do what feels right for your empire.

As far as taking out the pirates.  I play as the Vasari, with the Kostura canon at my disposal.  The Kostura damages and temporarally disables all ships and orbital structures.  With multiple shots (6-8) arriving in close succession at a single target, enemy ships/structures will even be destroyed.  This is my perferred method of pirate removal; just appear at the now-empty pirate base, siege it, and colonize it!  The downside is that this method takes a lot of researching, and a lot of investment (Kosturas, or seven of them, aren't cheap to build).

There is a similar strategy for the TEC using Novalith Canons (which destroy the coloney, but leave everything in the sky around it) and the Akkan Battlecruiser.  Still requires a lot of research and investment.

There is also the time-proven, but less efficient method, of sending a perverbial butt-load of ships to the pirate base and having them just get it done.  It will be messy, but you will have a pirate base as part of your empire.  Since, in your case, the pirate is a choke point, be sure that you have a way to defend your empire if your fleet is forced to kamikaze itself to take the pirate base.  A second fleet, a nicely upgraded starbase (if you have the entrenchment expansion), or a few frigate factories coupled with a strong economy would be recommended.

That map was sucessful in 3 hours 4 minutes thats the one with the pirate choke point.  I then played a medium-random map with 4 opponents, I chose one to became my ally we conqured it in 3 hours 19 minutes, made the most tactical choice of choosing the opponent on the opposite end of the map.  I was using vasari ally was also vasari, Normal opponents still. (maybe I should move up?)

I ended up leaving the pirate base as a pirate choke point, built enough of the migrators to get at least one to the other side, then started building all of my stuff from there.

I don't have entrenchment yet.  So what I do is a mix of a lot of the strategy(s) I have read.  get my free cap ship going, 2 weapons labs 2 civilian labs. scuttling the cap factory, rebuilding it later... after taking my first planet I build enough weapons labs to unlock the enforcers while I start building my fleet which I consider balanced, I adjusted it adding seige frigates, as I noticed that it was taking me longer to raze planets. Balanced being prefered as 10 of the enforcers, 20 of the assulters, 20 of the basic frigates(forgot what they were called.)

Then I start blitzing the AI. Building hangers with 1:1 fighter bomber ratio usually end up with 8 fighters 8 bombers (they really wreak some havoc on approching enemy). However, I do not do this with all of the planets just the ones I plan on keeping at the borders. for my last game I used the 2 jumps from the enemy build up forces tip. Built frigate factory and hangers at these planets. Other then that I build hangers in my buffer zones and choke points. buffer zones being the planets around the home world, in hopes that if I have an attack the hangers will hurt the opposing fleet.

Research; I don't invest much into research.  I usually forget to research, I get the basic stuff.. arctic colonization, volcanic colonization, the shield and hit point buffs. and the ships I use (the enforcer, and all of the frigates) but after that I am usually involved in combat (I still am in newbie faze where I switch to cinematic view and watch the battle take place. that type of stuff) if the lack of materials are killing me I throw a couple of points in harvesting.

Battles;  I like to destroy the cap ships, so I do that first then I usually let the AI take over.  I hate loosing cap ships destroys my moral, makes me depressed.  so I figure the AI it should do the same with the AI.  I then take out the factorys (no need for them to keep building as I am razing the planet.) I then select all of the forces and have them attack the planet the ones that can't attack usually find something else to do (taking down extractors ect.) Then I move on to the next tactical target.

I was playing TEC for a while, but started trying vasari.. Vasari seems to fit better with what I am trying to do, Destroy the enemy as fast as possible to get more games in, resulting in more practice with the result of becoming a more experienced player. (I Hope) I at least feel more experienced everytime I play a new game. I also find myself thinking more about what should I have done better, then what should I do. for some reason when I record it only lasts 36 seconds otherwise I would be posting the video's so you guys can see the progress and offer more specific tips. I thank those who posted already, I think it would be cool to now turn this post into a challange "small random map 1v1 - Medium AI Post your time"  maybe even give a synopsis of the battle. oh and post what race you played, and if you can the race of your opponent.