Honda World Motocross riders Evgeny Bobryshev and Max Nagl are looking to kick off their 2013 season at the inaugural MX1 World Championship night race being held in Losail, Qatar this weekend with a firm start to their championship campaigns.
For Evgeny Bobryshev the off-season has been good, with an intense physical training schedule, followed by testing in Japan and races at the Italian Championship, in which he finished in third place, as well as the arrival of his baby daughter in the early hours of Sunday morning. The Russian racer is certainly feeling physically strong with the winter training programme from Padova University, and the Honda pilot is at ease with the 2013 CRF450R, which he hopes to bring back to the forefront of the championship following last season.
Max Nagl will make his Grand Prix Honda debut this weekend, and despite a pre-season marred with injury, which saw him sit off the bike for a large proportion of the training period, the 25-year-old German is aiming for consistency this weekend. Nagl will be looking to get back up-to speed in terms of refining set-up, despite only riding for the first time last week since breaking his left hand, although he is feeling relatively comfortable on the bike with the injury.
It will certainly be an interesting weekend with the races being held on Saturday March 2 under the floodlights that Losail has become famous for in the MotoGP championship. The motocross track, situated next to the road race circuit, has been built in the last few months and will be a new experience for the MX1 racers. In addition to this there is a new format for overseas races, in which riders across the two classes compete in a single race each followed by a combined Super Final.
To see a video of what the riders have to say about the weekend, please click here. Please feel free to embed this video into your own website.
Evgeny Bobryshev #777
“It’s the first race and for sure it’s exciting to come to the first Grand Prix after a long time without all of the top contenders racing together. For me it has been a long period of training and preparation, so everyone in the team is ready and it will be good to see who is up-to the mark with my MX1 competitors. I feel totally prepared and I feel very positive; the bike is fantastic and everything has gone in the right way. We will have to wait and see how things go from a racing perspective, but the season is long and I want to be smart in the beginning to avoid what happened last year. I need to keep it on two wheels and aim to achieve what we’ve been working for. I am not sure about how things will look riding in the night under the lights, as we’ve never done this, but it’s more cool in temperature at night, which is a lot better for me. We have time to try different lenses to see what will be better with the goggles, as well as seeing if there are any shadows or anything. I have taken a look around Doha while I’ve been here and it’s been interesting to see the culture while we prepare for this race.”
Max Nagl #12
“I am feeling okay, but I am not expecting too much with the injury in my hand. If we count from last year since the Motocross of Nations in Lommel until now I have had only two complete weeks on the bike, so it’s nothing in comparison to what I would have liked. The bike set-up is still the setting from Japan in November, as I missed all of the tests since then with the injury, but it’s a decent base setting that we can work from. There are obviously going to be things we want to change as we start racing. That aside I am very pumped to be here racing in the night with the lights and the nice weather. We didn’t know how the injury would be, so I am just happy to be here and be in a good enough condition to race.”
Roger Harvey: Honda Europe Off-Road Manager
“It has been an intense off-season for us with a new bike to work with and of course inviting Max to the team. For Bobby (Bobryshev) things have gone smoothly, and we aim to take a calculated approach to the start of the season. Max (Nagl) hasn’t had as much time as he wanted on the bike, and he has missed a lot of the testing in the early part of this year due to a hand injury. We hope he will be able to get through this weekend without too much discomfort, and get himself back up-to full fitness as soon as possible. Finally, on behalf of Honda, I’d like to express our congratulations to Bobby and his wife Elena on the birth of their daughter, who arrived in the early hours of Sunday morning.”