The penultimate round of the 2024 FIM Motocross World Championships will take place this Sunday and Monday at the most eastern point of the series, the Magic City of Shanghai for The Oriental Beauty Valley MXGP of China!
Words and Images by Infront Moto Racing
The Shanghai International Off-Road Circuit is the venue for only the second MXGP event ever to be held in the country, within a city that is the third most populous in the world behind only Tokyo and Delhi. The track is in the Fengxian district just three kilometres north of Hangzhou Bay, the gateway to the East China Sea that leads to the Pacific Ocean.
The World Championships return to China for the first time since a hot and humid event in 2019, when it was the final round of the series and both MXGP and MX2 had already seen its Champions crowned. The situation is a very different one five years later!
There are still three riders with a chance of the MXGP world title, although Jeffrey Herlings, winner of the 2019 event here for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing, now has a 53-point mountain to climb and needs misfortune for his rivals. Team HRC’s Tim Gajser holds a 14-point advantage over reigning World Champion Jorge Prado, and the Red Bull GASGAS Factory Racing rider, who won the MX2 class in the 2019 Chinese race, comes in hot after winning the MXGP of Türkiye. Momentum has counted for very little this series, however, as nobody has won consecutive GPs since Prado won the first four rounds of the year!
The MX2 class has seen an internal team battle all season long between Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing riders Kay de Wolf and Lucas Coenen. Although Dutch flyer De Wolf has held the red plate since winning the opening GP, the pair have each won seven rounds this season, and Belgian Coenen, whose twin brother Sacha has also won two GPs but is absent from China through injury, narrowed the points gap to 44 after a dominant victory at Afyon.
Both classes have plenty of excitement in store for us at the vital penultimate round of what has been an incredible season of World Championship Motocross racing!
The Championship battle at the top of MXGP has continued to swing between the big three at the top of the standings, leaving the question of who will win the 14th World Championship between them still very much open to question! Since Pauls Jonass won the fifth round of the series in the Portuguese mud, the title contenders had won four GPs each until Prado added a fifth in Türkiye, and none of them have won back-to-back GPs in that time.
The Slovenian points leader was already World Champion for the third time before the 2019 event in China and was just edged off the podium with 3-4 finishes. With a two-day maximum, Gajser would be Champion if Prado scored less than 14 points over the weekend and Herlings was anything less than second each time.
For his own part, Prado might have noticed that if he wins every single race left in the calendar, including the RAM Qualifying Races, then he will be Champion at the final round even if Gajser finishes second to him in all six of those races! Those results would lead to a tie-break situation which would go in the Spaniard’s favour if that were the case! The #1 plate holder was also already Champion in 2019 before arriving at Shanghai, but he still won both races in MX2 that day to further cement his dominant second world title.
Herlings’ first race crash at Afyon, and painful recovery to tenth, made an already difficult task of catching Gajser look almost impossible. The all-time GP win record holder, who turns 30 years old on the Thursday before China, won his 86th GP in 2019 with a 2-1 scoreline to set up a strong finish to an injury-affected season.
He would of course go on to be part of his country’s first ever Monster Energy Motocross of Nations winning team that year, and his usual Team Netherlands partner in crime also shared the top positions in China back in 2019, as Glenn Coldenhoff won the Qualifying Race and the first GP race, only losing the overall on the second race tie-break. The Fantic Factory Racing rider lies seventh in the 2024 standings, five points behind the injured Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP pilot Calvin Vlaanderen.
Jeremy Seewer became the fifth rider to win an individual race in Türkiye and sits fourth in the Championship ahead of his Kawasaki Racing Team stable-mate Romain Febvre. Seewer completed the podium here in 2019 with 4-3 finishes, confirmed as 2nd in points that year, ahead of Coldenhoff.
Four other riders are making a return to China after also competing in 2019. Maxime Renaux, currently of Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP and enjoying a strong return from injury, was sixth in MX2, while Alberto Forato, now with Standing Construct Honda, was tenth in the same class. Just behind him was current Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing star Mattia Guadagnini. Also eleventh overall, but in MXGP, was today’s Fantic Factory Racing rider Brian Bogers.
The MXGP class will be joined by Australian riders Todd Waters, who previously raced in MXGP and reached ninth in the series in 2015. He lines up in China for the Raceline Husqvarna Racing Team, while Kirk Gibbs, twice member of the Australian MXoN team, will ride for the GASGAS Racing Team, also making the slightly shorter journey than the European riders have.
It will be a fascinating confrontation in MXGP, with many riders capable of getting amongst the top three in the series and bringing a brilliantly chaotic finish to this classic season!
MXGP – World Championship Top 10 Classification: 1. Tim Gajser (SLO, HON), 910 Points; 2. Jorge Prado (ESP, GAS), 896 Points; 3. Jeffrey Herlings (NED, KTM), 857 Pts; 4. Jeremy Seewer (SUI, KAW), 632 Pts; 5. Romain Febvre (FRA, KAW), 556 Points; 6. Calvin Vlaanderen (NED, YAM), 550 Pts; 7. Glenn Coldenhoff (NED, FAN), 545 Pts; 8. Kevin Horgmo (NOR, HON), 403 Pts; 9. Valentin Guillod (SUI, HON), 344 Pts; 10. Brian Bogers (NED, FAN), 306 Pts.
The battle at the top of MX2 is more of a two-man fight than in MXGP, but these two have won each of the last eight rounds between them, and four each, in an almighty tussle between teammates that is a treat to watch, especially when it comes to a last-lap duel as it did in Türkiye!
The biggest difference is that old saying, “you win on your bad days”. The non-winning GPs for De Wolf in those last eight rounds have been two seconds and two fifth places overall. In contrast, Coenen has been twice third, but also twice seventh in his off weekends.
That said, the Belgian has won 14 individual races to De Wolf’s 11, so a points tie would favour him. He just has a 44-point deficit to claw back first, and for sure will push all the way to get there! If the Dutchman gains 17 points on his teammate in China though, then he will be crowned World Champion a round early!
Of course, it’s not just about those two when it comes to the races. Third in the Championship for Red Bull GASGAS Factory Racing is Simon Laengenfelder, who has taken four race wins this season but still not climbed the top step of the podium. He is certainly desperate to do so.
Liam Everts won the RAM Qualifying Race in Türkiye for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing and will want a third GP win of the season to cement fourth in the series. Just behind him, Mikkel Haarup has shown some amazing speed for Monster Energy Triumph Racing but has been unable to convert that into his first race or GP win that would add a brilliant shine to the team’s debut season.
Reigning MX2 World Champion Andrea Adamo is another one who has a had a frustrating year for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing, but with two hard-pack circuits to come he will be a contender for victory, especially in the heat that we’re expecting in China.
The three-pronged attack from Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2, of Rick Elzinga, Thibault Benistant, and hot rookie Karlis Reisulis, have all been starting well and could also be a factor in the deliciously unpredictable maelstrom of MX2!
MX2 – World Championship Top 10 Classification: 1. Kay de Wolf (NED, HUS), 873 Points; 2. Lucas Coenen (BEL, HUS), 829 Pts; 3. Simon Laengenfelder (GER, GAS), 774 Points; 4. Liam Everts (BEL, KTM), 727 Pts; 5. Mikkel Haarup (DEN, TRI), 624 Pts; 6. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), 601 Pts; 7. Rick Elzinga (NED, YAM), 539 Pts; 8. Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), 456 Pts; 9. Camden McLellan (RSA, TRI), 368 Pts; 10. Ferruccio Zanchi (ITA, HON), 338 Pts.
TIMETABLE
SUNDAY: 9:15 MX2 Start Practice, 9:45 MXGP Start Practice, 10:45 MX2 Free Practice, 11:15 MXGP Free Practice, 13:20 MX2 Time Practice, 14:00 MXGP Time Practice, 15:25 MX2 RAM Qualifying Race, 16:10 MXGP RAM Qualifying Race.
MONDAY: 10:00 MX2 Warm-up, 10:20 MXGP Warm-up, 12:15 MX2 Race 1, 13:15 MXGP Race 1, 15:10 MX2 Race 2, 16:10 MXGP Race 2.
