After three unfamiliar venues in the last four rounds, it’s back to a place that everyone knows well as the FIM Motocross World Championships returns to the undulating valleys of the Loketske Serpentiny for the MXGP of Czech Republic this weekend!
The famous circuit, just up the hill from the beautiful gothic town of Loket in the Karlovy Vary region to the west of the country, has hosted 29 MXGP events since it first joined the calendar in 1995. The legend that is Joel Smets won that day, and did so three more times, to share the GP win record here with his Belgian contemporary Stefan Everts and latter-day legend Antonio Cairoli, who holds the record for most race wins here with ten.
Of the modern-day exponents, both Romain Febvre and Jeffrey Herlings are in a position to join those legends, having taken three GP victories each, while Jago Geerts has won two MX2 events at this iconic circuit. The Czech hillsides are renowned for throwing up exciting and unpredictable races, so nothing can be discounted this weekend!
By sheer coincidence, both Championships have emerged from the furious fun of Foxhills with exactly the same points gap at the top – just 11 points separate the leaders from their pursuers in each series!
Lucas Coenen still holds the red plate in MXGP for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing, but after a crash in the Qualifying Race in the UK, he was unable to finish either race on Sunday. His main chaser, five-time World Champion Jeffrey Herlings, took full advantage to claim the GP victory for Honda HRC Petronas, and reduced the gap by 57 points to trail the Belgian by that 11-point margin. Reigning Champion Romain Febvre is another 59 behind, in third place for Kawasaki Racing Team MXGP. Coenen won overall for the first time here last year, but there are still question marks over his fitness and his two chasers both know Loket extremely well.
Spaniard Guillem Farres has had an incredible run of three straight GP victories, going unbeaten in the Sunday GP races over the same period, and now wears the red plate for the first time in his career on his Triumph Racing Factory Team machine! Sacha Coenen battled through the pain of a recently-repaired collarbone at Foxhills, but is now 11 points behind Farres. His fellow Red Bull KTM Factory Racing pilot Simon Längenfelder has scored podium results in the last two rounds, and heads to Loket as the only rider in the MX2 field to have won a GP there!
As has been the case for the last few seasons at Loket, the weekend’s action will see three EMX Champions crowned over a hectic schedule!
The EMX2T European Championship will hold its solitary round for lovers of the premix machines, and the MRT Racing Team Beta squad have put both of their EMX250 regulars, Brando Rispoli and Alexis Fueri, into the fray, although Latvian flier Jekabs Kubulins could be a threat for JK Racing Yamaha. They will all have to contend with reigning EMX2t Champion and local Czech hero Vaclav Kovar on his SD Install KTM by VK101!
The youth classes of EMX85 and EMX65 will also be competing in the finals for their Championships after reaching this event through regional qualifying events. Germany’s Luca Nierychlo won his EMX85 regional qualifier but got hurt at the World Junior Championships, so the semi-final in Estonia was headed by the Latvian twins Martins and Patriks Cirulis, with Brit Harry Dale in third. The top three from Bulgaria were all French, with Tim Lopes taking the trophy from Mathys Agullo and Liam Morette!
The Estonian Semi-Finals in EMX65 were won by British rider Jack Waters on his JL Cox Motorsport KTM, ahead of Filip Juszczyk from Poland and Bruno Geitus from Latvia. The other Semi-Final at the old GP track of Sevlievo in Bulgaria was won by Italian Daniel Corda ahead of Spaniard Alonso Tribaldos Molina and Bulgarian Georgi Iliev.
The weekend will be full of thrills and spills for riders old and young at Loket this weekend!
Jeffrey Herlings
The biggest question in MXGP is whether or not Lucas Coenen will be able to line up, after last being seen limping off circuit at Foxhills. The Belgian won this GP last year and also scored an MX2 podium here in 2024. We keep our fingers crossed that the teenager can defend his series lead.
Jeffrey Herlings has missed an amazing eight GPs at Loket through injury, but still won three of the seven he has actually been able to enter! His last victory here was in 2018, so he will certainly be after equalling that record of four Loket wins this weekend. However, Romain Febvre, without a GP win with the number one plate, and at the only track where he has won more than twice, will be a strong contender as he looks to end his final year with Kawasaki in a strong fashion. The Frenchman took his first ever Qualifying Race win here back in 2014, when in the MX2 class.
Tim Gajser ended a six-GP podium drought in England, and sits fourth for Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP. He won his last GP at Loket in 2024, his first success here after five previous podium appearances. The Slovenian pulled away last weekend from his teammate Maxime Renaux, who is still fifth in the series, and the Frenchman won a race here in 2022 but only has a best of second overall around the Serpentiny!
Honda HRC Petronas rider Ruben Fernandez took his first Qualifying Race win of the year at Foxhills, which helped him jump up to sixth in the series. He has only raced at Loket four times, with a best of fourth overall last season. Andrea Adamo is three points behind the Spaniard, and has had rough times at Loket, but he won his first ever GP race and Qualifying Race here in 2023. How will the Red Bull KTM Factory Racing ace fare in his Czech MXGP debut?
Tom Vialle appears to be building his speed back up, although crashes plagued the Honda HRC Petronas man in England, and he is eighth in the series as he returns to Loket, where he had a best of fifth overall in his second MX2 title year of 2022.
The whole Paddock will be happy to see the return of Kay de Wolf this weekend, as the Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing pilot has been absent since getting hurt at the MXGP of Italy, and the 2024 MX2 Czech GP winner is tied on points with Kawasaki Racing Team MXGP’s Pauls Jonass for ninth in the series, although the Latvian sustained a concussion in England and won’t be at Loket. We wish him a speedy return, as Calvin Vlaanderen needs 29 points to get into the top ten for Red Bull Ducati Factory MX Team, at a circuit where he has taken a race win in each class, earlier in his career.
Previous Loket GP winners Jeremy Seewer and Jago Geerts enjoyed season-high races at Foxhills, so look to be moving into some form. The Belgian, who won here in MX2 in 2022 and ’23, finally got his MRT Racing Team Beta into the top ten in race two last week, while the Swiss rider, the Czech MXGP winner in 2022, made a good return to action for Venrooy KTM Racing with sixth overall.
The 450s are always a handful on the slick hardpack of the Czech hillsides, and this promises to be another awesome GP as the season hits round thirteen – surely someone will get lucky!
MXGP – World Championship Top 10 Classification: 1. Lucas Coenen (BEL, KTM), 566 points; 2. Jeffrey Herlings (NED, HON), 555 p.; 3. Romain Febvre (FRA, KAW), 494 p.; 4. Tim Gajser (SLO, YAM), 452 p.; 5. Maxime Renaux (FRA, YAM), 392 p.; 6. Ruben Fernandez (ESP, HON), 378 p.; 7. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), 375 p.; 8. Tom Vialle (FRA, HON), 317 p.; 9. Kay de Wolf (NED, HUS), 273 p.; 10. Pauls Jonass (LAT, KAW), 273 p.;
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1. Tim Gajser; 2. Romain Febvre
MX2 Start Loket 2025
Guillem Farres has been immaculate over the last three GPs, bringing his Sunday race win tally to 11 for the year, although he has only once won the Qualifying Race, that one coming in Portugal. His sole GP at Loket, last year, only yielded a sixth-place finish, but his factory Triumph will proudly display the red plate for the first time this weekend and he will want to do it proud as the fourth rider to wear it in MX2 this season!
Sacha Coenen will have been in physiotherapy sessions all week long in order to recover from the battering he gave his damaged right collarbone in England, but the tough little Belgian is a fighter and will be after his first podium result in Czechia after narrowly missing the third step last year.
Simon Längenfelder has recovered some form, including the last two Qualifying Race wins, but still lies 42 points off the lead, and 31 away from Sacha. The German, who enjoys the shortest journey of the season from his home town this weekend, won at Loket last year to extend his podium streak here to four in a row, and he will need every last drop of speed to bring Farres’ winning streak to an end!
The second Triumph Racing Factory Team rider Camden McLellan won the EMX85 final here in 2018, ahead of Kay de Wolf and Liam Everts, but the South African has had minimal success here since, with a best of fifth overall in 2023. With 62 points to make up on his teammate, his title chances need a turnaround to become realistic again.
Everts is another one who has yet to climb the podium in Czechia, but the Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing seems to be battling through his early season injuries to be a top three contender again, and fifth in the series seems to be a dead cert. Next along is the Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2 rookie Janis Reisulis, who has only raced once at Loket, in the 2018 EMX65 final! He was seventh that day, but is certainly a podium contender now.
Mathis Valin was not able to return to racing at Foxhills, and is still questionable for Kawasaki Racing Team MX2 at the track where he took his first career podium and Qualifying Race win last season. Karlis Reisulis is only 16 points behind him for Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2, and looking to improve on his best of eighth in the Czech Republic. Honda HRC Petronas’ young Italian Valerio Lata took a fine second to Valin last year’s Qualifying Race, but struggled to tenth on GP day, and is still ninth in this year’s standings.
The most loudly-supported rider of the whole weekend will certainly be Julius Mikula, who scored another top five overall in the UK to move into the Championship top ten as the highest privateer for Osička Racing KTM! The first Czech challenger for many years will receive great support, and his seventh in Qualifying last season was his best up to that point, although he has raised his standards since. The young Czech will be dreaming of a podium, and may well have the speed to get himself there!
The MXGP of Czech Republic is one of the most picturesque venues on the entire calendar, but the beauty masks the brutality of the fast and undulating hardpack Czech dirt! Come and join us for this jewel in the crown of MXGP as two tense Championships head towards the final quarter of the season!
MX2 – World Championship Top 10 Classification: 1. Guillem Farres (ESP, TRI), 563 points; 2. Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), 552 p.; 3. Simon Längenfelder (GER, KTM), 521 p.; 4. Camden Mc Lellan (RSA, TRI), 501 p.; 5. Liam Everts (BEL, HUS), 477 p.; 6. Janis Martins Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 434 p.; 7. Mathis Valin (FRA, KAW), 352 p.; 8. Karlis Alberts Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 336 p.; 9. Valerio Lata (ITA, HON), 307 p.; 10. Julius Mikula (CZE, KTM), 253 p.
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1. Julius Mikula; 2. Guillem Farres
All the photos from the MXGP of Czech Republic will be available HERE.
You can find the complete results HERE.
TIMETABLE
SATURDAY:
07:00 EMX2T Group 1 Free Practice, 07:25 EMX2T Group 2 Free Practice, 07:50 EMX65 Free Practice, 08:15 EMX85 Free Practice, 08:45 EMX2T Group 1 Qualifying Practice, 09:20 EMX2T Group 2 Qualifying Practice, 09:55 EMX65 Qualifying Practice, 10:30 MX2 Free Practice, 11:00 MXGP Free Practice, 12:05 EMX85 Qualifying Practice, 13:00 EMX2T Race 1, 13:45 MX2 Time Practice, 14:20 MXGP Time Practice, 15:15 EMX65 Race 1, 15:50 EMX85 Race 1, 16:35 MX2 Qualifying Race, 17:25 MXGP Qualifying Race.
SUNDAY:
08:40 EMX2T Race 2, 09:55 EMX65 Race 2, 10:25 MX2 Warm-up, 10:45 MXGP Warm-up, 11:30 EMX85 Race 2, 13:15 MX2 Race 1, 14:15 MXGP Race 1, 16:10 MX2 Race 2, 17:10 MXGP Race 2.
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