Jorge Prado stunned the world and even himself with a heat race win and third in the opening main event of the year to instantly justify his move to KTM after getting out of his Kawasaki deal following a tough 2025 where he did not gel with the Kawasaki.
Now he is showing what he can do when he is comfortable despite losing three championship points due to a post-race sound check on his KTM.
Jorge said: “This is really ahead of my expectations – the goal for this weekend was to just get through each session and do the best that I can. I had a great preparation leading into this year, but I am still so new to Supercross. Getting the Heat Race win was awesome, but I am really happy with my Main Event and to be on the podium. I rode within my limits, and still don’t have a lot of words to describe my feelings right now, but all I can say is that hard work always pays off! It’s great to start the season this way, so now we’ll keep learning and look forward to a new opportunity next week.”
On having comfort on the KTM Jorge commented: “I’ve been a KTM rider forever, forever.So the guys at KTM, they also had a great setup. So once I jumped back on the KTM, I felt like the bike was, I was like, man, this setup is basically good for me, like already from day one, so this was a big advantage because I could already put a lot of laps this winter, just cleaning laps, not even testing. So this was a big advantage for me to learn and I put so many hours on the bike.
“So coming to the weekend, I was more sure about myself and the track in a sense, like I knew what was gonna happen, if I hit the whoops wrong, if I hit a case something or and I had such a great feeling with the bike that I was feeling safe and when you feel safe, you can always progress and go a little bit faster every time and I think this is what happened this year with me. I always felt safe when I was running Supercross so I could always make progress.
“And then, like I said also fitness wise, I felt very good.So I just had to click the laps and clean laps and that’s it, but yeah, the KTM, it’s a good bike for me. I really understand the bike and for some reason, it just clicks with me.”
