By Joe Koraith/Doha
It was a tale of double delights in the opening round of the FIM World Motorcross Championship held here at the Losail MX track yesterday. German rider Maximillian Nagl won a comprehensive double victory in the MXGP category, leading both races from start to finish. In the MX2 category, it was Dutchman Jeffrey Herlings who secured an emotional double win. And adding to the doubles was France’s Livia Lancelot who won both races in the women’s category.
In the MXGP, a lot of pre-race talk was about the rivalry between reigning world champion Antonio Cairoli and his American challenger Ryan Villopoto. Cairoli earned himself a podium with a third position in the first race and a fourth in the second. Villopoto, on the other hand, had a disastrous start to the season, finishing in ninth place in the first race and eighth in the second.
Nagl leaves Doha leading the championship with 50 points. In second place is Clement Desalle with 44 points and in third position is last year’s QatarGP winner Paulin Gautier with 38 points.
In Race 1, Nagl got a great start off the gates and shot into the lead from fourth place. Cairoli who had won the qualifying race found himself in second place going into the first turn. Villopoto had a disastrous start when his bike stalled at the gates. The American dropped to 22nd place, leaving himself with the unenvious task of having to claw his way back up the order.
At the top, in the third lap, Desalle got past Cairoli and things settled down there.
The focus of the race was on how many positions Villopoto would recover and he went on a charge in the initial laps, making up nine places by the end of the fifth lap. But then he committed a mistake on the sixth lap and dropped back down to 19th.
Back at the top, there was no change in the order as Nagl was comfortably in the lead with Desalle and Cairoli in second and third respectively.
Villopoto began his second charge in the race and this time he was able to recover a commendable 10 places to finish the race in ninth place. Considering all the trouble that he had, it was a noteworthy performance from the American.
The German Nagl got his first win of the season with Desalle in second and the defending champion Cairoli in third completing the podium.
Emotional Herlings
It was the MX2 category however that provided the drama yesterday. Herlings had suffered a severe injury last season which saw him concede the championship to Jordi Tixier. But more than the loss of the title, it was the extent of the injury that had left him worried. During the pre-match press conference he had said that he was happy to be able to just make it to Qatar and be able to race. But he produced two perfect races to start the season with a bang. So important were these wins to him, that Herlings broke down crying after winning the second race.
Race 1 saw an exciting battle between Herlings and Fernandis. Jonass got a good start and took the lead with Herlings in second and Fernandis in third. But Jonass couldn’t keep up the pace and was soon overtaken by both Herlings and Fernandis. And then in the seventh lap, Frenchman Fernandis overtook Herlings to take the race lead. Herlings fell back a bit but then started picking up his pace and was able to overtake Fernandis in the 13th lap. The Dutchman was then able to consolidate his position and take his first win of the season. Fernandis was in second place and Belgian rider Juilen Lieber grabbed the third spot on the podium. Tixier got a bad start and couldn’t recover from it, finishing in sixth place.
In the second race, Herlings was the one who got the lead off the gates and was able to maintain it for a comfortable victory. The drama, however took place behind him as Fernandis who was in second place at the start of the race, had an awkward fall in front of the mechanics area in the third lap and lost quite a few places. The Frenchman could only manage a fourth place finish. Lieber earned himself back to back podiums with a second place finish and Russian Aleksandr Tonkov finished in third for his first podium this season.
Livia gets the double
In the women’s championship, France’s Livia Lancelot got herself a double win in the opening round with a clinical performance. In second place was defending champion Kiara Fontanesi who came second in both the races. The Italian now trails Lancelot by six points. In third place, in the championship classification is Australian Meghan Rutledge who finished Race 1 in third place and Race 2 in fourth.
MXGP winner Maximilian Nagl and MX2 winner Jeffrey Hierlings.
