Red Bull KTM’s Tony Cairoli will be hunting his third ‘gold medal’ at the 2016 Motocross of Nations at Maggiora where the 30-year-old will be arguably the star attraction on September 24-25th.
The ’16 MXGP runner-up will continue a love-hate affair with the atmospheric circuit. In 2013 he narrowly lost the overall MXGP victory to Gautier Paulin after a fantastic duel. He was victorious in 2014 with a 1-1 scorecard but then crashed in qualification last summer and fractured his left arm – an injury that eventually led to the Sicilian pulling out of the fight for the 2015 crown.
Now Cairoli goes to back to Maggiora carrying the hopes of the country on his shoulders and with two young teammates in the form of Samuele Bernardini and Michele Cervellin.
“It is a really important race for me,” said Cairoli who won the MXGP category at the Nations in Belgium and Germany in 2012 and 2013 and coming off a Grand Prix term that he described as his “worst” for riding and feeling. “We don’t have the best team to win – that’s clear – and maybe not for the podium but we will do our best to be there. I will try to win the overall – that’s my goal and without that, we cannot think about the podium. So I have a tough job by I will try to bring as little points as possible.”
Cairoli experimented with KTM factory 450SX-F and 350 material in the second part of the MXGP season and eventually settled back on the 450 after trying new 2018 prototype parts. #222 recently signed a contract extension with the Austrians to remain in ‘orange’ for another three seasons.
