MXGP Insider No.30: Tim Gajser

Welcome to our weekly web-exclusive column, Transmoto‘s MXGP Insider. Penned each week by Vurbmoto’s David Bulmer, the MXGP Insider will present the story-behind-the-stories of the European motocross scene.

A big congratulations to Tim Gajser for getting his first race win in the MX2 class at the Goias GP this past weekend. The Honda rider has taken big strides this past year to not only get up to speed with the big guns but to be faster than them on the odd occasion. I first remember watching him in the EMX125 class in 2011, where he was just pipped to the title after a DNF in a moto in England. He also won a race at the Junior World Championships that year before going even better the following year in 2012 by wrapping up both the European and World titles in extremely convincing fashion.

Unfortunately 2013 didn’t go so well as he struggled to adapt to the speed in the MX2 class after initially beginning the year in the EMX250 class. It was perhaps a case of too much, too soon for the youngster but this year he’s come out swinging with a number of impressive performances which have done enough to convince the bosses at Honda that he was worth tying up for a few more years. For me, it was the smartest bit of business performed this summer and this latest result in Brazil confirms the future is very bright for Team Red. Obviously Herlings will start 2015 as the  favourite and rightly so, but don’t be surprised to see Gajser right up their challenging when the season starts next February in Qatar.

Obviously though, the main talking point was Tixier’s performance and the fact that he ‘only’ managed to get 34 points in the two races. That’s more than enough if Herlings doesn’t suit up in Mexico but at time of press, no news has come out regarding whether he will or won’t race this weekend.

Something that did come out from the weekend is the fact that Jordi Tixier will definitely be at CLS Kawasaki next year in the MX2 class. In America, Dean Wilson was extremely careful not to say who he’ll be riding for next year (it’s Red Bull KTM in the 450 Class) but Tixier had no such concerns about letting everyone know that he’ll be swapping his orange bike for green in a few weeks time. I’m sure it was hard to leave arguably the best bike in the pits but CLS Kawasaki are one of the better teams out there and I’m sure he’s looking forward to the challenge.

Speaking of good bikes, it was interesting to see Julien Lieber rip off a couple of good starts in Brazil on-board his new Standing Construct KTM. After a falling out with Rockstar Suzuki (thought to be about the bike), he swapped to the KTM and doesn’t seem to have any problems getting to grips with the different machine. As Valentin Guillod has proved all year, the bike is one of the most powerful off the line and with a small dude like Lieber piloting it, only Butron (obviously) could match him. If he can keep doing this in Mexico and then in Latvia for the Motocross of Nations, it puts Belgium back up there as a big threat for the Chamberlain Trophy.