We caught up with the lengendary Roger de Coster at the end of the MXoN weekend at Ironman and the Belgian legend was very impressed with team Belgium and gave us his thoughts on the very ambitious and fast Coenen brothers who are in a rush to get Stateside, plus Roger’s view on Liam Everts – Roger raced his grandad Harry!
Another motocross of nations for you, I have no idea how many that is that you’ve witnessed now, but we’ll start with team Belgium, they were so close to a podium there like us both Coenen brothers and Liam on your equipment. Was that nice to see from your side team Belgium so strong?
Yeah it was nice and but very disappointing and I felt really bad for Sasha that what happened you know and it was just some mud and stuck in the brake pedal so the bike slowed a lot and in the jump and then Justin Cooper behind him he was committed and landed on top of him and yeah it’s bad luck because like you say they were in the hunt to win that was possible it was really possible and it’s been a long time and good to see the Belgian team a really young team with Liam and the two Coonan brothers and they have a good future you know.
And Lucas almost won the world title this year at 18 and again he was pushing the Lawrence brothers today what are your thoughts on him and how fast he grows?
Both Lucas and Sasha have a natural speed you know and they need a little bit more experience of course and I talked with them today after the race and it’s pretty cool to see they’re not making excuses they just say that they can learn more and that they will get better and work on getting better so it’s pretty nice. They want to ride in America so I guess moments like this is good for the communication.
They definitely want to come over here they’re gonna probably do a few races next year when there is no conflicting GP schedule and then they hope that then they can learn supercross well enough to come over full-time for the following year for 27 or so.
Is racing Anaheim a possibility?
You know, they have no experience in supercross and they need to find out where they sit you know where what their level is.
So you got to see Liam Everts there on a 450 and you raced with Harry!
I think the 450 fits in well. He rides a 450 really good you know this is I think this is his first major race on a 450 and he did he did a good job.
Is it amazing for you to have seen race with Harry watched Stefan’s career and now you’re watching Liam these three iterations you’ve seen it all?
Yeah it’s pretty crazy yeah that shows how many years I’ve been involved and he started to show on my body also.
Was it weird for you not to be American team manager this year?
I chose not to be. I told the AMA that it was time for me to take a step back and let some younger guys do the job and I still want them to do good and you know watching them and I still will help when I can but I think the place feels better with some younger people.
Get the full interview below:
