KTM CRAWFORD’S COMEBACK

Ask anyone about coming back from a busted femur, and they’ll quickly tell you that it takes a fair while to regain your confidence – both physically and mentally – and get back to pre-injury performance levels. Well, somehow KTM Racing Team’s MX2 rider, 25-year-old Nathan Crawford, missed that memo (perhaps that’s got something to do with the fact the #199 came back from a busted leg in 2016 and went on to nearly win the MX2 title!?). At his first race back from injury this year – in late July, some five months after an operation to repair his busted femur – Crawford ran an ominously impressive 4-2 for second Overall at, despite the Coffs Harbour track’s tricky muddy conditions. And then last weekend, at QMP’s Round 7 of the eight-round ProMX Championship, a quietly confident Crawford backed it up with a clinical 1-1 result; a 50-point hall to win the MX2 class Overall on yet another rough track that constantly seemed to reach up a bite riders.

What stood out most about that QMP performance was not only how fit and fast Crawford proved to be (against a field of season-hardened and race-honed rivals), but how he deftly managed the race from the front of the field like he’d been doing it all season (rather than sitting on the couch!).

“Going 4-2 back at Coffs Harbour was a big weight lifted off my shoulders,” Crawford conceded. “It was a like a six-month build-up. When you’re sitting on the couch with an injury like that, the anticipation builds and you want to come back. Basically, the Coffs result lifted all of that weight off my shoulders. It felt really good and I have to give a massive shoutout to the whole team at KTM. They have been so patient with me over the last six months, and I couldn’t ask for a better way to repay them.

“So it was really special to be able to get my first win with the KTM Racing Team a few weeks later in my home state of Queensland,” said a jubilant Crawford after the QMP weekend’s racing. “The day started off a little bit slow for me – I got sixth in qualifying, which was obviously not ideal – but we sorted it out for the motos, made a couple of bike changes and got the double win. I pulled a holeshot in the last race, which made that race feel a lot easier. I can’t really ask for much more – going 1-1 is basically perfect in our eyes. So I’m keen to keep the ball rolling into Coolum next weekend,” Crawford went on to say.

QMP’s Round 7 was also a breakout weekend for Crawford’s teammate, Kirk Gibbs, who finally carded his first moto win of the season. After battling his own injuries woes (thumb ligaments) at recent rounds, the 2015 Australian MX1-class champ finished his day on a high-note by winning the two-part second moto aboard his KTM 450SX-F. Earlier in the day, the 33-year-old had posted the third quickest time in the Top 10 Shootout, despite a heavy fall. And after an average start in race one, he could only salvage a seventh-place finish. But Gibbsy showed a return to form of old in the final two back-to-back 15-minite motos, with an impressive 2-1 result elevating him third Overall for the round.

The eighth and final round of the 2022 Australian ProMX Championship takes place this coming weekend at Queensland’s notoriously brutal Coolum Pines sand track.