World Champion Romain Febvre took part in one of the best MXGP races of the year and clinched an emphatic third victory of the season on home soil to send 41,000 fans at St Jean D’Angely into rapture. The Grand Prix of France drew the 2016 FIM Motocross World Championship up to round ten of eighteen and the Monster Energy Yamaha rider’s duel across both motos with HRC’s Tim Gajser in sweaty conditions in western France was as gripping as it was tense.
Strands of the fever, fandom and general clamour for motocross evident at a rip-roaring Ernee and the 2015 Motocross of Nations further north from St Jean last October were in place today with a sea of flags and noisy eruptions of approval every time a native rider made a position or moved up the order. The French bring their own special flavour of support and spectacle to motorsports and MXGP was given a timely reminder under bright skies and warm early summer temperatures. The amphitheatre setting created a din that seemed to fill the countryside as the riders had to cope with the fast and steep downhills and uphill drags across the stony, hard terrain.
Febvre – star of that memorable Nations – was the darling of the public and was searching for a positive response to the injury adversity suffered at the GP of Spain last weekend when he braved his way to sixth with a painful elbow. Recovered, and with more strength in his left arm, ‘461’ was aggressive and attacking. Together with Gajser – the pair currently running at a higher level than their peers, as evidenced by the gap of over thirty seconds to Tony Cairoli in the first moto – Febvre chased, snapped and kept within two seconds of each other throughout the race distance. The champion valiantly pursued the Slovenian on the last lap but a move around the outside on the penultimate turn was foiled and Gajser sealed the win.
With both riders side-by-side exiting the first corner of the second sprint a replay of the face-off was in store. This time it was Gajser’ turn to shadow and harry. Ploughing through the backmarkers Febvre was slightly more decisive and began to lose his red shadow. By the final two laps the twenty-four year old had a cushion of several seconds and celebrated at his home Grand Prix for the second year in a row (his maiden MXGP success coming at Villars sous Ecot last summer) thanks to his 2-1 in comparison to Gajser’s 1-2.
“I’m really happy to be back on the top step,” smiled Romain. “It was a difficult time last week but this is part of motocross and I saved my championship there because if I did not ride then I would have lost fifty points. One week later and I’m winning the GP again in France and in front of your home crowd is amazing.”
“Tim was fast and when he passed me in the first moto I tried to follow his lines and rhythm and at the end we came really close,” he added. “I was really disappointed; when you finish ten seconds behind then you cannot say “I had the speed” but when it less than one second you are even more [disappointed]. I knew I would have to give everything in the second moto and that’s what I did.”
Febvre wasn’t able to close any points to his rival in the championship dispute due to the balanced scorecard and remains adrift of the red plate by 24 (a single moto victory) but with eight Grands Prix and sixteen races still to run. Monster Energy Kawasaki’s Clement Desalle was fifth for his second top five finish on the bounce and Kemea Yamaha’s Valentin Guillod made it into the top seven.
In MX2 many were expecting 2014 Motocross of Nations hero Dylan Ferrandis (still the only rider to have beaten Jeffrey Herlings this year – the Dutchman won again in France to go ten Grands Prix undefeated and has notched nineteen of twenty motos) to shine at St Jean but the Monster Energy Kawasaki rider was undone by a crash in each moto that left him scrabbling to recover to fifth overall. Instead it was Kemea Yamaha’s Benoit Paturel who roused the masses. The Frenchman led the majority of the first race until succumbing to Herlings’ charge and then rode to a solid third after a close scrap with Jeremy Seewer and Pauls Jonass in the second dash. ‘6’ happily filled the second step of the box and uncorked his second champagne bottle in seven days.
“It is incredible to be on the podium in front of the public; it is amazing to do it here and I’m really happy with my race this weekend,” the Yamaha man said. “I hope I can stay here more times here now and it was cool to race with Jeffrey in the first race.”
FIM Women’s World Champion Kiara Fontanesi savoured her first taste of champagne this season and with her Fonta Racing Honda CRF by claiming third position overall. The Italian has ruled WMX for the last four years but the combination of injury and poor luck (technical problems and crashes) means that the reigning number one has had to be patient to get her hands on a maiden trophy of 2016. ‘8’ rode to a 3-3 in France and although she was not able to push Livia Lancelot or Nancy Van Der Ven for victory she did secure her biggest points haul of the year and remains on the fringes of the title dispute by sitting in fifth spot and 72 points adrift of Lancelot. Encouragingly for Fontanesi two of the last three rounds of the WMX series takes place in her favoured sandy conditions; beginning with her home Grand Prix at Mantova in three weeks time.
St Jean was the sloping stage for Bud Racing Kawasaki’s Darian Sanayei to dazzle in Grand Prix’s feeder class: EMX250. The last and final tier of the European Championship ladder is a hotly contested division and the American has been working his way up the standings after three podium appearances in the previous five rounds. On Saturday the youngster seized control of the first moto to post his first win in the competition. On Sunday he gave his rivals and the watching hoards some déjà vu and now sits second in the series with four more fixtures to go. Australia’s Hunter Lawrence is sadly out of the frame with a knee injury that will require surgery this week.
Spain, France and now a breather for MXGP with another double – Great Britain and Italy – next on the schedule. The vast expanses and popular layout of Matterley Basin will ramp up Grand Prix action in two weeks time.