As the MXGP season rolls into the demanding sands of Riola Sardo, all eyes are on the return of Jeffrey Herlings. After missing the opening rounds due to an ACL injury, the five-time World Champion is back on the gate this weekend. Speaking with Lisa Leyland from MXGP-TV, Herlings opens up about his recovery, expectations for his return, dealing with criticism, and his thoughts on Lucas Coenen stepping up to MXGP. Here’s what The Bullet had to say…
An update on his knee…
Yeah it’s been, well actually at the last race of last year, the week after the Motocross of Nations, I tore my ACL and it took a bit of time before I could get surgery because of a lot of swelling in my knee. Then I had the surgery done and then I just missed out not being ready for Argentina.
But yeah, I just came back riding, I did five or six days I think now, so trust me I’m really not ready to go racing but I just feel like if not I’ll go practice anyway. I did a small race two weeks ago and I got, well I wouldn’t say injured but somebody hit me on the back so I was like okay I’m not going to go right between like real amateurs so I try to just try racing with the professionals and just see where I get. I said I’ve done just a very few days and just taking it as a practice.
On if he expected the injury to take so long to recover…
Well I could have possibly raced but there was like quite a big risk with how the ACL was, my knee was ready to go, just the ACL we didn’t know how strong it was and I didn’t want to take the risk and for example go to Argentina and maybe tore it again and I would be out for another six months. I would miss the entire season and so I didn’t want to take that risk so I decided okay let’s give it a few more weeks and come back for Riola and yeah here we are.
On being 30 and having dealt with so many injuries…
Obviously still like people say like oh you must be in a lot of pain every morning when you wake up, I’m like actually when I wake up I’m all good. I don’t have any problems like okay just the injury what I have going on at that time but furthermore I still feel good. I feel like I still got some racing in me and I just know I need to be patient. I know I will get a lot of keyboard warriors on Monday morning saying oh hey Herlings is done, end of his career because he’s not doing good, but I know the real reason why not. It is just because I barely rode so I hope to be better by around six, seven or eight. At that point you know, I would have done more riding and then I hope to be getting more competitive again.
On dealing with keyboard warriors…
Whenever I get hurt it’s like Motocross almost explodes: oh he’s hurt again and then I know some other guys who get way more hurt than I am and nobody speaks about it so I’m like why just always me? That’s right when people are not talking about you that’s even the worst thing. But I still read all of it and I’m like why? Many people don’t really know what’s going on and the reasons behind. You know you can’t make everyone happy I always say. Let’s try to first have a good weekend, enjoy the weekend and probably it’s my first two 35 minutes moto’s for a long time.
On coming back at one of the toughest tracks on the calendar…
No but I mean I grew up in the sand so for me riding the sand is more easy than for coming back and for example last time in Saint Jean when it was muddy and rainy. So to come back at a rutty muddy track wasn’t going to be fun so I think this is a bit better. This is always a calm GP, not too many spectators and not too much pressure… Everything is a bit more calm. The track is a bit more easy going so I think this was a good race to come back. Like I said we have no expectations, the team knows my situation I’ve only been on the bike a couple of times. I mean our goal for the rest of the year is to be ready by race 7-8 and then try to fight for podiums and hopefully win again.
On Lucas Coenen…
I think it’s really good for him. Like I mean I’m quite surprised he’s only 18 and he hasn’t won an MX2 championship so I wouldn’t have not done it if I was him. But still for him to come to the 450cc and then be on the podium on his third race… I mean you have to give the guy credit. We all know he’s very talented, I mean he’s still very young and aggressive and things like that but hey he’s talented and he’s good. I have a lot of respect for the kid and I think he has an awesome future ahead of him.
Coming back to the question about the bike right now I haven’t really tested yet first of all because it doesn’t really make sense for me as I’m still not on my old pace and I’m too slow. To make a setup for when I’m off pace, it doesn’t really make sense so first I need to get back up to pace then then start testing. I think it’s always better to have two guys on the track with the same bike instead of one so we can get double of the feedback.
