BAUER SEALS THE EMX125 EUROPEAN TITLE WITH A PERFECT WEEKEND IN UDDEVALLA

Ricardo Bauer turned the red plate to gold at Glimminge Motorstadion on Sunday morning, wrapping up the 2026 EMX125 European Championship Presented by FMF Racing with a round to spare after a faultless 1-1 scorecard on the oldest circuit on the calendar.

The Austrian’s double gave him his third consecutive overall win and his fifth of the season, and left him 62 points clear of his Norman KTM Factory Rookies teammate Moritz Ernecker with only the final round in Turkiye still to run. Sleny Goyer and Gennaro Utech joined him on the podium, Utech reaching an EMX125 podium for the first time in his career.

Ricardo Bauer

A couple of riders tipped over on the exit of the first turn in race one, but at the front it was TMX Competition’s Liam Bruneau who led the way from championship leader Bauer, with Ryan Oppliger third and the Yamaha Europe Monster Energy MJC pair of Goyer and Levi Townley fourth and fifth. Townley was shoved back very quickly and had already dropped to around tenth by the time he completed the opening lap.

Bauer took his opportunity at the first time of asking, making the move on the Frenchman Bruneau to take over the lead, and from there he established a decent gap. Oppliger ran off the side of the track on lap two and went from third to fifth, while Utech, on the Fantic Factory Racing EMX machine, came up the inside of Goyer to move into fourth on the same lap. His teammate Bertram Thorius, the fastest rider in time practice, had to work his way forward from a poor start and eventually found his way up to seventh.

Goyer then made a mistake that put him under pressure from his own teammate, and a second error left him having to find his way back past Oppliger, by which point Townley had already gone through into third. When Utech fell with a couple of laps to go, Townley had the final podium place to himself, and Utech came home fourth. Bauer completed race one from Bruneau, Townley, Utech and Goyer, with Oppliger sixth, Thorius seventh and Emil Ziemer eighth. MCV Motorsport-TM Moto’s Riccardo Pini was classified ninth after a two-position penalty for failing post-race noise control, and Timo Heuver was tenth. Ernecker, back from injury, came home 13th, while Liam Sörensson moved up to 20th on the final lap to score a point in front of his home crowd.

With the title on the line in race two, Bauer snuck up the inside and led the way into turn two, making the move stick on Goyer, with Thorius, Bruneau, Townley and Utech all in the mix behind. Ernecker, the only other rider still mathematically in the hunt, completed the opening lap back in around 13th or 14th place.

The first incident came when Bruneau drifted wide on the exit of a turn and Townley had nowhere to go, putting both out of podium contention. Oppliger then went down from sixth and dropped as far as 18th, eventually finishing outside the points. Further forward, Ziemer came up the inside of Utech to take over third, and the pair traded the place over the closing laps.

Utech got back through on the penultimate lap and made it stick on the last to reclaim the final podium spot, with Ziemer fourth and Thorius fifth. Out front Bauer was never headed, leading all 14 laps for his eighth race win of the season, with Goyer holding second. David Cracco took the Dreams Racing KTM to sixth ahead of Lucas Leok, Pini, Dante Lantz and Ernecker.

The 1-1 gave Bauer the overall on 50 points from Goyer and Utech, both on 38, and confirmed him as the 2026 EMX125 European Champion Presented by FMF Racing with one round still to run. The Austrian adds the European crown to the FIM 125cc Junior World Championship he won earlier this year and the EMX65 European title he took in 2022.

Ricardo Bauer: “I have no words for this. I want to thank my team, my sponsors, my trainer, my dad and my whole family, who have been around and helped me to achieve this. We had a tough season coming into it, but now we have managed to get the Junior World Championship and the European Championship title, so I’m really happy. We have had so many back-to-back wins and so many good races in a row. I’m happy to be number one now. Thanks to everyone.”

Sleny Goyer: “It was not the best weekend for me. The first race was not good. I had done a good start but I crashed at the end of the race, so I had fifth in the first race. In the second race I got the holeshot, and then Ricardo passed me on the first lap and I just followed him and took his lines. Second overall. Thank you to everyone and thank you to my family.”

Gennaro Utech: “I don’t know what to say, it was a really difficult weekend. In the first race I crashed in the last two laps when I tried to pass for second, and I finished fourth. But the second race was a consistent race with a good start, and I finished third, passing on the last lap for the third position. It was a really amazing race. Big thanks to my team and to my family, who are at home, and thank you to everyone.”

1. Sleny Goyer; 2. Gennaro Utech

EMX125 – Race 1 – Top 10 Classification: 1. Ricardo Bauer (AUT, KTM), 29:42.505; 2. Liam Bruneau (FRA, KTM), +0:01.770; 3. Levi Townley (NZL, Yamaha), +0:03.795; 4. Gennaro Utech (ITA, Fantic), +0:23.112; 5. Sleny Goyer (FRA, Yamaha), +0:27.082; 6. Ryan Oppliger (SUI, KTM), +0:31.529; 7. Bertram Thorius (DEN, Fantic), +0:32.794; 8. Emil Ziemer (SUI, KTM), +0:45.226; 9. Riccardo Pini (ITA, TM), +0:32.349; 10. Timo Heuver (NED, Fantic), +0:49.671

EMX125 – Race 2 – Top 10 Classification: 1. Ricardo Bauer (AUT, KTM), 30:14.521; 2. Sleny Goyer (FRA, Yamaha), +0:00.621; 3. Gennaro Utech (ITA, Fantic), +0:06.423; 4. Emil Ziemer (SUI, KTM), +0:06.576; 5. Bertram Thorius (DEN, Fantic), +0:08.608; 6. David Cracco (ITA, KTM), +0:27.718; 7. Lucas Leok (EST, KTM), +0:28.645; 8. Riccardo Pini (ITA, TM), +0:31.627; 9. Dante Lantz (SWE, KTM), +0:52.444; 10. Moritz Ernecker (AUT, KTM), +0:55.690

EMX125 Overall – Top 10 Classification: 1. Ricardo Bauer (AUT, KTM), 50 points; 2. Sleny Goyer (FRA, YAM), 38 p.; 3. Gennaro Utech (ITA, FAN), 38 p.; 4. Emil Ziemer (SUI, KTM), 31 p.; 5. Bertram Thorius (DEN, FAN), 30 p.; 6. Levi Townley (NZL, YAM), 29 p.; 7. Riccardo Pini (ITA, TM), 25 p.; 8. Liam Bruneau (FRA, KTM), 25 p.; 9. Lucas Leok (EST, KTM), 19 p.; 10. Moritz Ernecker (AUT, KTM), 19 p.

EMX125 Championship – Top 10 Classification: 1. Ricardo Bauer (AUT, KTM), 369 points; 2. Moritz Ernecker (AUT, KTM), 307 p.; 3. Sleny Goyer (FRA, YAM), 296 p.; 4. Bertram Thorius (DEN, FAN), 256 p.; 5. Emil Ziemer (SUI, KTM), 230 p.; 6. Gennaro Utech (ITA, FAN), 223 p.; 7. David Cracco (ITA, KTM), 189 p.; 8. Liam Bruneau (FRA, KTM), 177 p.; 9. Riccardo Pini (ITA, TM), 169 p.; 10. Lucas Leok (EST, KTM), 165 p.

EMX125 Manufacturers – Top 10 Classification: 1. KTM, 439 points; 2. Yamaha, 356 p.; 3. Fantic, 307 p.; 4. TM, 242 p.; 5. GASGAS, 87 p.; 6. Husqvarna, 72 p.