Re-Up: Ryan Villopoto vs The World

With a video production crew on-hand, last week at Glen Helen Raceway in San Bernardino, California, four-time AMA Supercross champion, Ryan Villopoto, completed what will be his last US-based test session before packing it all up and flying to Europe to begin what will be his highly anticipated run at the 2015 FIM MXGP World Championship.

Atop what will be his potent Monster Energy Kawasaki Racing Team KX450F race bike, RV absolutely flew around the high speed, abnormally rough and chopped up Glen Helen circuit. America’s great hope to bring back the first MXGP world title in over 20 years, Ryan looked brilliantly quick and all who were present at the test/video shoot – Kawasaki team technicians, family members and those close to the overall RV racing program – were visibly pleased by the form Ryan is showing a month shy of the opening round of the World Championship slated for Qatar on February 28. Immediately after completing the test and shoot, RV sat down with Monster Energy to speak about his imminent and historic globetrotting odyssey which will see him compete in 18 races in 16 different nations.

“I want to win,” said Villopoto, the first rider in the 58-year history of the World Championship to try and win both a supercross title and premier class world title. “I’m not doing the work now not to. I’ve been putting in the work. I’m going in there wanting to win and I’m going to give it everything I have.”

Villopoto also pointed out that he believes the challenge he is about to take will captivate race fans the world over, saying, “I think now having all these people who have watched me race the last nine years in America, they’ll now actually have somebody to watch and relate to in the World Championship. I think this challenge will bring a lot of people in to see what’s going on with Grand Prix motocross. I’ve had a lot of people tell me, ‘Yeah, I keep up on the GPs about once a month and check to see what’s going on. Now, with you racing, we’re going to be watching it and checking it all out every Sunday’. I think it’s going to go both ways. I think this will get a lot of eyes on MXGP that have never been on it in the past.”

And what will it take for Ryan Villopoto, considered by most to be the greatest motocross racer in the world?

“It’s going to come down to consistency. It’s a long season. It’s going to be like a supercross season here, but I think in the end the cream always kind of rises to the top. I think there will be two or three guys who will be, I don’t want to say always there, but that you can see will be there all season long and I think seven-time world champion Antonio Cairoli is going to be one of them. If everything goes well, I’ll be one of those guys. Clément Desalle seems like he is one of those guys. So do Kevin Strijbos and Gautier Paulin. There are a lot of GP guys that we go racing against at the Motocross des Nations every year and they’re all fast. Now this year is going to be a bit different just because the des Nations is just one race, the World Championship is going to be a whole series. It’s time to go racing and I’m going racing to win.”