Of all the stories heading into the British MXGP at Foxhill, one of the biggest surrounded the return of Jeremy Seewer. After a split with Ducati left the Swiss star on the sidelines, many wondered if – and when – the Swiss talent would make his way back onto the MXGP gate.
Just weeks later, Seewer is back in the paddock wearing orange after linking up with Van Venrooy KTM, and despite having just a handful of days testing on a KTM for the first time in his career, he impressed on his return with a sixth overall finish at the tough track of Foxhill.
We caught up with Seewer to discuss his comeback, why he chose KTM, the rumours surrounding a possible Suzuki return, how close that idea really came to becoming reality, and what the future could hold as he looks to rebuild his career after a turbulent few months.
GateDrop: Jeremy, it’s your first GP back, but it’s actually the best GP of the year for you I believe so far, on a new bike, you must be pretty happy with that, you couldn’t have asked for much more, right?
Seewer: No I couldn’t be, especially after two months away from racing. I missed some races, these boys were racing and I was on the couch watching. You can train and do practice moto’s as much as you want, it’s not the same when you line up here, especially on gnarly tracks like this, rutted, down, up, crazy kind of track, but super nice. I’m pumped, P6 overall, good speed, sure I missed a few things to be even better. I know it needs a little bit of time, I mean new bike, I’ve never ridden a KTM in my life, I just had actually one or two days of testing. Everything is very new but I think the start was good.
GateDrop: Just to go back, whenever you parted ways with Ducati, I mean I was expecting you to go back to Switzerland and spend quite a lot of time there, but it seems like you spent most of your time in Holland and Belgium, testing a lot of different bikes, did you go home at all?
Seewer: I did go home for about 10 days.
GateDrop: Was it nice to go home and sort of reset?
Seewer: I had to just switch off, I was even far away from racing in those 10 days, I didn’t know what was going on. I was like, I don’t give a sh*t. After that, I was back on it, straight away the motivation came back to push hard, train hard, physically, then testing bikes to see what opportunities I have, see what’s the best to come back on, the fastest and the best. I think I made the right choice, I proved it to this weekend, and now I’m back working on myself, which is super cool.
GateDrop: I believe, correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe your father contacted Sylvain Geboers and bought an old Suzuki’s off him?
Seewer: No, that’s not true. The true story is, Sylvain sold his collection, he had a huge Suzuki collection, and there was one bike of mine still there, the last bike I’ve been riding at the MXoN back in 2017. I called Sylvain and I was like hey, I hear you are selling your collection and I asked if I can get my bike, because it means a lot to me at home. I have kind of a museum with some Suzuki’s especially. I got this bike and it’s now at home in the museum, I didn’t ride that bike, it’s too nice to ride it. I rode the stock Suzuki, yes, but that’s the true story about it.
GateDrop: I know that you did ride a Suzuki, like you just said, I mean if you’d have felt like that was the best bike, do you think realistically you could have came and raced MXGP with Suzuki or not?
Seewer: I mean, I rode it for two days just because that was the first bike that a friend of mine had around, a stock Suzuki. I called him, and asked hey can we take that bike just to go riding for fun, that was the first two days I went back on the bike after everything ended with Ducati, just to enjoy riding and it was the first bike around without calling crazy guys, without too much effort. I did two days on it, like I said with a stock bike, it was a little bit modified suspension and it was fun.
Suzuki is still a good bike even though it’s 10 years old, I mean Kenny won the Supercross title on it, so it’s great. Realistically to come back in GP’s you need to start to get a fast engine, you need to test it, you need to get so many things together to make that happen. By the time I would get those things together, a lot of people involved, a lot of effort, a lot of work, a lot of testing, I think it would be next year and I didn’t have time to wait for next year. But thinking about it, it would be sick, I would love to do that and everybody would be crazy about it, but in real life I don’t think it would be possible.
GateDrop: I got a lot of texts about it (laughs). What was the first impression of the KTM when you first got on it and obviously how did the opportunity come around for you to be a KTM test rider and then race with Van Venrooy KTM?
Seewer: The first impression was incredible. I was in the sand on day one and I mean I grew up on hardpack. I had quite a bumpy sand track straight up and I was like, wow this thing works. I felt straight away their slogan, ready to race, it’s not a lie how this bike is, I feel like the Japanese bikes, they need a lot of fine tuning, a lot of special things, the bikes, the factory bikes are going crazy just to make them raceable on that level.
With the KTM, a few simple things and they are ready to go, this I saw and felt straight away and that suited me a lot the bike, I felt like wow, this is it. The opportunity with KTM, we know the people there, my manager talked to Diego from KTM and somehow they made it happen with Van Venrooy KTM. They were like, yes, let’s try and push this, we would be open to make a new spot for Jeremy because obviously Mattia got replaced by Rick, so they opened a new spot and they saw the opportunity I guess and pushed for it to make it happen. I’m super pleased, thankful for everybody involved to get this opportunity and I think this could have a future. I’m happy where I’m at now.
GateDrop: I was watching the first moto with one of your previous mechanics, Cippa, and we were both saying the pace is really good, just race intensity is probably all you need, you’re just a bit rusty, you haven’t raced a GP since Lacapelle in France, do you feel the same and are you happy with your speed?
Seewer: I do agree. Even yesterday in timed practice and stuff, I had the speed for a lap which is already great. I expected maybe I needed another race for that but this was there straight up which is good. The race intensity, the speed is there, I just need to manage the race and it has to come more natural, now it’s like f**k, let’s go, let’s try to follow and it’s tough. I stiffen up a little bit and especially on that track, but this has to come a bit more natural but that will come after one, two or three more races when I’m back in the rhythm. I think we are all human, we can’t turn that on from zero to hundred, except unless maybe your name is Jett Lawrence or something.
GateDrop: The last question, is your deal with KTM just until the end of the season for now and will you do the rest of the MXGP races or are the fly away rounds a case of wait and see on that one?
Seewer: Honestly, the plan is to do the rest of the GP’s but we didn’t talk too much, the focus is on now and the next few GP’s to get myself back on track. If everything works out great, I think we are going to have a future together and we will do the fly aways as well. I don’t know 100% yet.
