As the EMX250 championship hits full stride and the domestic British season begins to take shape, we caught up with Shaun Simpson to get his insight on life under the SS24 Gabriel KTM awning so far in 2025. From managing emerging talent like Gyan Doensen and navigating injuries with Max Werner, to bringing in a surprise addition in MX2 World Championship contender Oriol Oliver, Simpson gives a candid look behind the scenes of his growing team. We also touch on budgets, team dynamics, and even fatherhood, as Shaun opens up about his approach to nurturing not only race results but also the right environment for development—whether that’s on the track or at home. Here’s what the former GP winner had to say…
GateDrop: Shaun, let’s go back to the start of the year. We’re well into the EMX250 championship now and only the second British championship, so we’ll touch on Gyan Doensen first. First of all, what’s it been like to work with him? For me, he kind of reminds me of Cas Valk. Obviously he’s Dutch, but he seems well-grounded, and he’s got a nice family around him too. So what’s it been like working with him, first and foremost?
Simpson: Yeah, Gyan’s been a great addition to the team. Obviously with us being based in Belgium, in Lommel, with the team workshop, it’s quite handy having Gyan quite close to us. He doesn’t have his driving license, or he didn’t have it until this week, but he’s still not allowed to drive on his own, still got to have someone in the car with him. But no, it’s quite nice having the family, a lot of support there, practice days, race days, the family’s behind him and that makes a big difference. His mum and dad are really into it, but they kind of just let Gyan deal with the team, myself and he’s got the trainer from the Dutch Federation.
It’s a nice package, but Gyan would openly say himself he’s been quite frustrated with the results that he’s had this year. I definitely feel like he could have performed better. Last weekend in Lugo was a bit more of what I was expecting, a seventh and a fourth overall. That’s more of at least a normal day at the races, somewhere close to the podium. Been very up and down, a few rookie-like mistakes, unnecessary crashes and a couple of bad starts haven’t really helped us along the way, but the weather’s been a big factor as well. Not easy to get good consistent results when the conditions are like that, but the cream always rises to the top as they say, so you’ve got to be in it to win it, you’ve got to be there every week. I think there’s a few things we could improve on with Gyan to get him where he needs to be, but we are making progress in the right direction.
GateDrop: I mean he’s pretty much won his whole career and he’s not really fighting for wins at the minute, so that must be quite frustrating for him. But at the same time, you know he’s quite young, you might look at Noel Zanocz, he’s getting results, but I think Doensen is a year or maybe close to two years younger… So I think it’ll probably just take a bit of time and a bit of getting used to the class. It’s not an easy step, it’s maybe the most difficult step to make in EMX anyway, going from the 125cc to the 250cc.
Simpson: I would say so. I certainly think that people these days are sort of blinded by the fact that you’ve got Jett Lawrence, Jeffrey Herlings, Ken Roczen, Coenen Brothers, that you should be winning world championships when you’re 15, 16, 17. That’s not the norm. So, you know at 17 years old, Gyan I think is in a perfect position in his career to progress in a nice fashion and get himself into a good championship position this year in EMX. Have a go at it again next year, try and be EMX champion and then progress through the KTM family further where that might lead him, I’m not sure. But you know our goal is to have riders coming through here that in two or three years’ time we can go and shake their hand, after winning a world title with the factory KTM team. That’s the ultimate goal.
You know, on paper and in Gyan’s head, in my head and everyone’s head, he probably could be doing better than he is. But I think if you actually look back at the basics, we’re on track making progression at a nice pace.
GateDrop: Is he on a two-year deal with this team or is it still to be decided?
Simpson: It’s still to be decided. Obviously KTM’s got a lot of things going on in the background, a lot of riders’ contracts are up for renewal in the factory teams as well, so there will be a bit of shuffling around going on but I’d like to keep Gyan on for a second year in EMX250. We’ll just see how that plays out for us. We’ve obviously got to look at guys coming up from the 125cc class as well and see where they’re placed. It is a little bit too early to say but exciting times ahead.
GateDrop: Just on Max Werner, he didn’t have a great start to the season. It was his second year in the class, obviously it’s all been hit on the head with the injury but what was his winter like and maybe expecting more at the start of the year? I feel like at Hawkstone International anyway he was definitely better last year on the Honda…
Simpson: Yeah, I think Max was a tough one to call because with it being his second year in the class, you’d expect him to be right at the front. Last year he was running fourths and fifths and then the odd 10th and 12th but we really felt like with the bike and the surroundings that he could make that step up to be one of the top three guys in the championship. It didn’t really go our way and struggled a little bit with setup at the beginning of the year and the results fell a little bit flat before the injury at Hawkstone Park but we had quite a solid winter. I must admit we’ve done pretty much the same as we’ve done with Gyan, with Josh Gilbert and Cas Valk last year, put a lot of laps in on the bike and I was there quite a bit of the time.
We tried to build with Max, tried to listen to him and go in that direction but it didn’t really seem to work out with us so it was interesting because just before his injury at Hawkstone Park we changed a few things with his program and we were hoping to see that progression but we didn’t get to see that unfortunately.
GateDrop: What is the latest with his injury? You might expect him on the bike soon but obviously the title’s gone now so there’s probably not much point rushing, you know yourself how high the level of racing is so probably get to 90% before he gets back racing…
Simpson: I think he’s got the sling off now and he’s starting to make some gentle movements, starting some physio so he’s probably looking at another three weeks until he can maybe get on a bike. That’ll be quite easy going to start with a couple of weeks and then maybe about a month after that of full training before we can see him back so it’s going to be a couple of months yet.
I think it takes us to around Finland time, somewhere like that we could expect him to be making a return but as you say no rush, the championship’s gone, let’s get him back to as near 100% fitness and bike condition as we can and come back and really try and show people what we’ve done with Max and what Max can do towards the end of the season.
GateDrop: Oriol Oliver, you’ve had the opportunity to draft him under the awning, just how did that all come about? Obviously, he was with a team and he had to leave it due to financial reasons but I think Diego Clemont was maybe involved, can you just talk me through how the opportunity came to get him underneath this awning?
Simpson: It was very strange how it all come about because Oriol’s manager had sent Diego from KTM a message saying that Oriol was looking for a ride and it was actually Simon Gabriel, my boss, that approached Diego and said what do you want to do because Max is injured. We would like to replace him, we want two guys under the awning and there was no one springing to mind in the EMX250 class that didn’t already have a ride. So, Diego had just said you wouldn’t be interested in running Oriol and Simon said straight away, yeah, why not? Obviously Oriol’s too old for the EMX250 class and he’s actually in his final year in the MX2 World Championship class so we were motivated to give him a go.
He’s not someone I knew more than just seeing on the track but he’s a brilliant guy to work with. He is very switched on with regard to bike setup and what he likes and what he doesn’t like so easy to work with and he’s serious about his racing. He’s really dedicated even today he’s riding in Spain to keep his Spanish championship title hopes alive and then he’ll fly in tonight and race here for his first ever British championship at Canada Heights.
Our goal is to obviously we’ve announced we’re keeping him until the end of the year, we’d like to see Oriol complete the Spanish championship, win his home championship and with seven rounds of the British championship to go we’d like to see him being in the hunt for the title at the end of the year with that potential British championship there and we’d like to push him as close as we can and finish top 10 in the world championship in MX2.
GateDrop: I would like to ask you about the budgets because obviously a lot of the time that’s done before the start of the season and you guys are only planning to do EMX250, now there’s obviously a few races that won’t have that series and you guys will be going, Germany I think was one and Lommel is going to be one so in terms of the budget was that something you needed to discuss or was it all straightforward… I assume you will go to the awning the full truck to the MX2 rounds just with him…
Simpson: Of course. You know, I think when you’re doing a budget at the beginning of the year you’ve got to have a bit in mind that you’re going to go over budget or you know unforeseen things in the budget. Teutschenthal is not that far from the workshop, we’re talking about a six-hour drive and Loket and Lommel as well another two that are not on the EMX250 calendar but again they’re not that far away within the seven or eight hours driving. It’s just a case of loading the truck up and doing an extra weekend at the racetrack, Gyan will wild card MX2 at Lommel as well so that’ll be interesting to see how he fares there.
There is a bit of unforeseen changes in the budget but right now we plan to run two riders and we are running two riders – those changes will come into force when you see us with three riders under the awning for the remaining rounds of the championship however many that might be.
GateDrop: Oriol is very smooth, I really like his style as he’s very technical. How have you found that working with him and has he surprised you in any way because like you said I don’t think you really spoke to him before he got this ride so what’s he been like to work with, he seems like a really nice guy and he’s fast so that is always good…
Simpson: He’s so easy going as I say. He is really into his racing and he’s the type of guy you watch and you think he’s going to be quite a bit off here but he’s actually always right up there. He really looks like he’s got another two or three seconds a lap in the tank but he’s very efficient on the bike, he’s quite a wee lad so he rides the bike nice and he doesn’t really abuse the clutch. He uses the engine well and he rides it nice to get the most out of the engine and the suspension. He’s not too fussy but he does know what he wants especially the direction he wants to go so that’s really a dream to work with a guy like.
It’s so easy going but you know we’re not just one for sitting back and thinking okay he’s happy, we’ve still got a few things we want to try with him and improve because as you said MX2 is such a tightly contested class. We’re looking for the last few tenths on the track so we’ve got some suspension upgrades for him either this weekend or next weekend. We’ll just work with him to see if we can get him as comfortable as he can but he’s rode KTM for a few years so he really rates our bike, the engine, suspension and everything we’re doing around the races. A happy camp is a fast camp and I’m very much of the opinion that if we can keep the atmosphere here with the crew and the riders, keep it serious but fun at the same time then the boys can go out on track with a free head and really get the job done on track when it’s time to go racing.
GateDrop: It’s funny because coming into the season all the focus was on the EMX250 class, you probably weren’t even really thinking of MX2, now all of a sudden you’ve got a rider in MX2 and I mean you probably have a goal you’d like to see him on the podium, it’s not going to be easy but it’s not impossible… Just on Oriol, I feel like he’s so smooth and technical but he does have a few crashes here or there but they’re never that big they’re just small tip overs, maybe a concentration thing?
Simpson: Yeah, I mean Gyan as well. There’s been a few unforced errors that you know definitely don’t like to see if it’s unavoidable. If you’re really pushing hard and you have a crash then I can accept it, the small tip overs the small front ends washing out or silly mistakes like wrong line choice… it’s all part of learning. But you’ve got to remember that Oriol’s 23 now and old enough for the class, he’s experienced enough to know better. On the flip side Gyan’s only 17 so you’ve got to expect some of those. The Roczen’s and Herlings, only come along once every 10-15 years so you’ve got to cut the guys a bit of slack and I know what it’s like to be a rider. You know sometimes you are very concentrated, and something happens so from the outside it’s frustrating sometimes to watch but you know it’s motocross at the end of the day and things can happen. You’ve just got to try and keep those mistakes to a minimum and gather as many points as you can and see where you end up.
GateDrop: Young Angus, what’s it like being a father to him and has he got on a bike yet does he love it maybe a future GP rider in many years to come who knows but first and foremost is he into it. He does ride, doesn’t he?
Simpson: I bought him golf clubs, he’s got a tennis racket, football, rugby ball, we go swimming, he’s got a BMX and he does have a motocross bike so he loves sport. I’ve always said to my wife I don’t know how my parents done it you know for 10-15 years my dad was a professional and sort of 10 years off and then back on the road with me for 20 years. I would like to avoid it if possible but I’ve always said to my wife Rachel and she agrees… to give the kids the opportunity to be a kid, enjoy what they want to do grab. The football one day, the golf clubs the next and the motocross bike the next day. This week he said, Dad I want to go out on the bike so we went out on the bike. As long as they’re having fun at that ages, when he gets a bit older and he wants to choose to do golf, tennis, be a scientist or a doctor… I really don’t mind as long as they are happy, and they can earn a crust. I’ll not be pushing him into doing motocross at all but if the time does come that I need to be spinning spanners or at the track with my welly boots on then that may have to just happen.
