Red Bull KTM has taken the World MX1 and MX2 championships in convincing style at the Grand Prix of Europe over the weekend, with both Tony Cairoli and Jeffrey Herlings rounding out their 2012 championships in typical style.
Taking the title exactly a year to the day since his mother died, Tony Cairoli seemed visibly more emotional than he has when taking any of his previous titles. The Italian had, by his standards, a slightly nervy Saturday qualifying race but was hoisted round both Sunday races by the Italian crowd to seal the 2012 MX1 title with two moto wins. Jeffrey Herlings made sure it was an orange party in Italy with a just as typical double moto victory in MX2 – cementing further KTM’s hold on the MX1 and MX2 titles in recent years.
But it wasn’t all orange at Faenza as Monster Energy Yamaha’s Mel Pocock breezed six wins from a possible seven in the EMX2 championship and wrapped up the 2012 title. Watched by 24,000 sunburnt fans, including Monster Energy Tech3 MotoGP star Andrea Dovizioso, Pocock is the first racer from the UK to lift European gold plate. Fittingly he rode almost the whole race at the steep hillside circuit without his rear brake, after a stone smashed the cable free. Despite the rare mechanical glitch for the Dixon crew, Mighty Mel brought the Yamaha home in fourth to a shower of champagne corks on Saturday evening.
“I’m speechless to be honest,” said Pocock afterwards. “Coming down some of those fast hills the last thing I needed was not have a rear brake but I did my best and finishing fourth was enough. Coming into this season I didn’t really know the strength of the other guys in the class and set a realistic goal of a top six finish by the end of the championship but when I was fastest in the very first session in France in June I thought ‘let’s see what we can really do here’. It has been an amazing season so far and we’re not done yet. A big thanks to Nick, Steve, Ash, my family and everyone who helped put the package together.” Pocock can now look towards finishing the MX2 British Championship that he also currently leads at (Little Silver, October 7).
Tommy Searle trucked on behind season-long rival Jeffrey Herlings in both MX2 motos to confirm his status as runner-up in the championship but his “I did the best I could” quote from Twitter was a familiar one at this stage of the 2012 season.
tough day here in italy track was difficult i went 2-2 not amaazing but was ok did the best i could!
– tommy searle (@tommysearle100) September 9, 2012
congratulations to jeffrey on the championship he rode great all year and was well deserved! had som good races with him and enjoyed it all!
– tommy searle (@tommysearle100) September 9, 2012
Searle’s fellow Brit at the meaningful end of the MX2 table, Jake Nicholls, didn’t have the weekend he was hoping for at the rough, hard-pack Faenza track. While his main rival for fourth in the championship, Jordi Tixier, had a stormer to bag fourth overall, Jake was slogging it out for ninth. With the pair seperated by eight points it sets up the final round of the series at the German Teutschenthal circuit in two weeks perfectly. Fingers crossed for The Reverend.
MX1 Championship standings:
1. Tony Cairoli 642
2. Clement Desalle 554
3. Gautier Paulin 502
4. Christophe Pourcel 496
5. Ken de Dycker 478
MX2 Championship standings:
1. Jeffrey Herlings 672
2. Tommy Searle 601
3. Jeremy van Horebeek 559
4. Jake Nicholls 409
5. Jordi Tixier 401
