After 17 years at KTM, Jeffrey Herlings changed manufacturers for the first time in his career in January and has been exposed to a lot of newness. We asked the five-time world champion what it was like to switch things up for the first time in his legendary career and found out what the differences are between the bikes and the teams.
And he had some interesting things to say!
“I feel this bike is better for me for the start, still the KTM is a great bike,” Jeffrey emphasised, “don’t get me wrong, because I don’t want to be negative because I left there. It’s a great bike, but I feel for me, this bike is better, and I think, honestly, when we get to GP races when there’s really good grip, I feel like the bike is even better than in the sand.
“I think there’s a lot of potential, and we’re waiting for new products even, because like I said, it’s a prototype bike, and yeah, there’s a lot of potential, and the guys take it very serious. I’m not even used to it, like in KTM, we would have like a little meeting after every weekend, just like five minutes, and that’s it. Well, here, we just sit together for a meeting for like 20 minutes after every single session!
“It’s totally different, for me this is a higher level, that doesn’t mean what KTM were doing wasn’t good, because they won this weekend, we haven’t won Spanish GP). But still, I feel like they’re even the next level professional than what we had at KTM, and like I said, it’s nothing bad, it’s just another step.
On riding the bike for the first time Herlings said he was nervous/excited and couldn’t sleep for two weeks! “Yeah, because I never tested the bikes, and everybody’s like, oh, yeah, for sure you did? No, I didn’t. I swear to God, I never tested another bike when I was on KTM. So, the first day, I really couldn’t sleep for like two weeks, so like, what if this bike is going to be terrible? What if this bike is going to be not suiting me?
“And then I swear, when I jumped on actually, I had a good feeling. It was a stock bike, easy going track and pace. Actually, straight up, I’m like, oh, the handling is really insane. Just on full factory suspension, but the motor was completely stock. Just immediately get into it, like a couple of days, and we hopped on the HRC bike, like, after a few days. But then when I jumped from the stock bike to the HRC bike, I was like, ooh, this thing is a rocket ship!
Herlings is just at the beginning of his journey with the team, you would expect things to only get better from here and this weekend he is racing the British championship on Sunday then the Dutch Masters on Monday to get ready for the sand of Riola the weekend after – dedication!
