Stat Sheet: GP of Leon

There is so much that goes on at each MXGP round that it is inevitable that you will overlook certain things. That is where our ‘Stat Sheet’ feature comes into play, however, as we focus on the details that you may have missed.

MXGP

– The fact that the series leader, Romain Febvre, has not won the most races thus far this year serves as proof that parity is rife in MXGP. When was the last time that the series leader after five rounds had won less races than someone else? Well, it hasn’t happened since the current format was adopted in 2004. The closest that we have come to this was in 2008, when there were five overall victors (including the series leader) in five races.

– There were four riders who had finished in the top ten in every moto prior to Leon, but the most recent fixture wasn’t kind to two of those. Jeremy van Horebeek came up just short in moto one, finishing eleventh, and Shaun Simpson was ruled out of moto two after being bulldozed down by Alessandro Lupino. Romain Febvre and Tim Gajser are now the only two riders who can boast ten moto finishes somewhere in the first ten spots.

– Tim Gajser was arguably more dominant than he has ever been in Leon, as he topped both practice sessions and then took pole position. Tim trailed Febvre in both morning warm-up and the first encounter, but the deficit was just two tenths in warm-up and then four seconds in race one. It is worth noting that he had the fastest lap by more than half a second in race one though! Gajser then obviously won moto two in a convincing fashion, set the fastest time and took the overall victory.

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– Are we overlooking Max Nagl as a title contender? His points haul through the first two rounds wasn’t overly impressive, but he has rebounded nicely with three successive overall podium finishes and one moto win. If the points were based on the last three rounds alone, Gajser (130) would lead Febvre (127) and Nagl (121). That proves that Max has been fairly even with the two juggernauts, which is certainly food for thought.

– Evgeny Bobryshev believed that he had “less speed and confidence” on Sunday, but still recorded a pair of fourth place finishes. His improvement this year is still remarkable, as he has thirty-two points more than he did one year ago. A fourth, which he acquired just once, was his best result through five rounds last year, whereas this season he has finished second, third and then fourth five times in the motos run!

– Antonio Cairoli had his worst round this year, scoring just twenty-seven points. When did he last have a total so low? At the European, Italian, German and American fixtures last year, he scored less than that. It is extremely rare for Tony to do so poorly, as crashes and injuries were what caused those results last year. Cairoli’s lowest total at a GP in 2014 was thirty-three, so he didn’t dip below twenty-seven. The same goes for 2013, actually, so perhaps this is a sign of the tide changing?

– We ran some stats on the amount of points that Cairoli had after Valkenswaard. It seems that now is a good time to do it again, seeing as he is a whopping forty-eight points down! Since moving into the premier class, he has never faced a deficit this large after five rounds. The closest he has come to this was one year ago, when he was thirty points back after the first five fixtures.

– Valentin Guillod has seemingly stepped up in the last three motos, as he has gone 8-9-8 – that is a considerable improvement over his previous three finishes (12-16-13). The Mexican hard-pack would have played a major part in this, as he is comfier on that terrain. You can expect him to drop back a little at the next round, Kegums, before becoming a regular in the top ten in the weeks that follow.

– The second MXGP moto wasn’t exactly the most exciting, was it? We can be honest about that. The top six riders all finished in the same position that they were in at the end of lap one and the lap times don’t necessarily indicate that anyone deserved better either (aside from Simpson and Lupino, of course).

– There was one interesting point that jumped off the page, when perusing the lap times. The fastest time that Steven Lenoir set in the race, a 1:57.908, was almost a second and a half slower then the next slowest fastest lap (a 1:56.629 from Jose Butron). Everyone else had a time in the one minute fifty-five second range or lower. It is only fair that I mention that I have excluded the sole Mexican, Eduardo Andrade, from this. Eduardo was two laps down in each race, so was basically in his own little world out there.

MX2

– The fact that we are five rounds in and I’m really searching for things to say about Jeffrey Herlings probably does not bode well, does it? His fastest lap time in moto one was just under a second faster than anyone else, then his best time in the second race was just under two seconds faster. Jeffrey is that much better right now.

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– Jeremy Seewer is clearly the second best rider in the series standings, hence why it is a little surprising that he has only finished second in a moto once. Consistency has been his greatest strength, hence why he has sixty-seven more points than he had at this point last year. Leon was his fourth consecutive podium finish.

– Vsevolod Brylyakov, who is relatively unknown, garnered the first podium finish of his career in Mexico. The Russian did it in an impressive fashion too, as he charged through to second in moto one and rebounded from a crash in the next race. ‘Seva’ had two top five finishes in Sweden last year, which was what really put him on the map, but only finished in the top ten in one other moto. This is quite the step up.

– Who else, like Brylyakov, had their best moto finish of the year on Sunday? Well, there was just Jorge Zaragoza (tenth), Henry Jacobi (thirteenth). You would think there would be more, given the light entry list, right?

– The riders that stood alongside Jeffrey Herlings on the podium were not necessarily the next two fastest guys in the class. Max Anstie had the second fastest time in both motos and Pauls Jonass had the third best time in moto one. Aleksandr Tonkov actually had the third fastest lap time in the second MX2 encounter.

– There was a positive point for Max Anstie in Mexico, as it was the first time this year that he managed to score points in both motos. That was because of a technicality, however, as his bike stopped with two laps to go in race one and he was handed three points due to the lack of riders. How disastrous has his season been? Max had more points after five rounds last year, despite the fact that he didn’t even compete in one of the rounds due to injury.

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– Max’s teammate, Thomas Covington, was still pushing through the pain of a broken ankle on Sunday, but that wasn’t his only issue. The American slipped off in the qualifying race and injured his hand, so his 12-14 scorecard was quite heroic. Thomas was going to get his hand checked out this week, but there have been no further updates.

– Why did Damon Graulus pull out early on in race one and not take part in the second race? The JTech Honda rider crashed early on in moto one and was concerned about his legs, as initial signs indicated that it was injured. It seems that nothing is broken, however, following further checks.

Words: Lewis Phillips | Image: Sean Ogden