Loket (Czech Republic) – The thirteenth round of the FIM Motocross World Championship, held on the famous and technical Loket track, brought great satisfaction to Team Honda Maddii ABF Italia. At this Czech stop, the team fielded only Maxime Grau in the MX2 class, while the EMX250 European Championship riders will return to action at the next round on the sand of Lommel, Belgium.
The Loket weekend did not start in the best way: due to a heavy crash during Saturday’s qualifying practice, Maxime Grau was forced to line up at the starting gate from 40th and last position. This was an extremely penalizing condition on a track where getting a good start is crucial to fight at the front.
Despite this severe handicap, the young French rider and the team put together two Sunday motos to remember:
In Race 1, after an exceptional jump off the line from the back of the grid, Grau immediately slotted into the top 10, setting a great pace and finishing in 8th place.
In the second moto, Maxime outdid himself: with another fantastic start, he rode with great determination and maturity, securing an outstanding 6th position.
Thanks to his combined scores (8-6), Maxime Grau claimed a fantastic 6th place in the Overall Day Classification, marking his best-ever career result both overall and in a single World Championship moto.
Marco Maddii, Team Manager: “A wonderful weekend! We achieved our best-ever result both overall and in a single moto with 6th place. We are thrilled, especially considering that yesterday Maxime crashed and had to go 40th to the gate, which made the starts very difficult. Despite this, he managed to get two great starts inside the top 10 and then rode really well. Congratulations to Maxime for all his hard work; we are super happy with today’s result here in Loket.”
