Another weekend and another great GP at wonderfully beautiful and spectacular Maggiora as Jeffrey Herlings finally found his old speed! It took a stone in the back brake to release that speed but an angry Herlings got over the mental block and showed everyone and himself the speed was still there when it came to crunch time!
His laptimes were very impressive on a track that shouldn’t suit him and once he had the chance of the overall win in race two Herlings ride smart before making the vital move on Coldenhoff to take him from fourth to first – I think we can safely say Herlings is back!
And Mattia Guadagnini is for real as Red Bull KTM do the double in Italy! A 2-1 and once again displaying complete composure out front, despite it being on the brink of his first GP win and in front of his home crowd (albeit sparse), Guadagnini took the win and the red plate in style. With confidence soaring and two moto wins in two rounds, the Italian has quickly establish himself as a title contender and the EMX2 class showed again just what a brilliant feeding ground it was with Thibault Benistant taking a brilliant moto one win – the rookie kids are ready to take on the established stars.
Jago Geerts showed impressive determination to take his first podium and hopefully can improve from here but you have to feel sorry for poor Tom Vialle who was in too mich pain to complete moto one and now has a real challenge on his hands to defend his world title.
Tim Gajser was strangely quiet all day in MXGP, he cut Herlings off out of the gate in race one only for Herlings to return the favour with a gentle bump in turn one in race two! But while Gajser was still riding well he didn’t have that extra speed or the starts to capitalize on a track that wasn’t easy to pass on. He now only has a 6 point over Herlings heading into Oss, has the momentum just changed?
The track was over-watered and ripped on Saturday night to create ruts, but while there was a lot of ruts, most weren’t usable in race one and it was very tough to pass with the track more one-lined that Saturday’s EMX racing. By the second moto things were opening up and it was good for MX2 and ready to be prime for MXGP until the rain came down! The skills and precision to navigate that track in the wet was impressive, one mistake on an uphill would cost a lot of time even in the dry never-mind the wet as Gajser found to his cost in race two!
But with just 19 points between the top four in MXGP now with Prado only 27 back it’s all to play for in MXGP heading to Herlings’ home round in Oss in two weeks – and MX2 is absolutely wide open!
Article: Jonathan McCready
Images: InFront Moto Racing
