IN
THE
WIND
P48
Gajser, Prado Roll On At MXGP of Russia
T
im Gajser and Jorge Prado
picked up where they left
off from the last MXGP round
by winning again at the latest
round—the MXGP of Russia—in
Orlyonok, June 8-9. Gajser is
now the hunted after taking over
the MXGP points lead following
a 1-1 sweep, demoting previous
leader series leader Antonio Cai-
roli to second place. And Prado
extended his MX2 championship
lead over Thomas Kjer Olsen with
another 1-1 performance.
Good starts in both motos put
Gajser (Honda HRC) in excellent
positions early on. He took full
advantage of those quick get-
aways by taking wire-to-wire wins
both times. Swiss rider Arnaud
Tonus, however, gave Gajser a
bit of a scare in the first moto.
He closed in on Gajser late in
the race and made a desperate
attempt to pass the Honda rider
a turn before the finish line but
went down. The Yamaha rider,
Tonus, recovered with plenty of
time to spare and kept second.
Third in the moto went to Ro-
main Febvre (Yamaha), followed
by a returning Jeffrey Herlings
(KTM) and Jeremy Seewer (Ya-
maha).
Things went slightly easier
for Gajser in the second moto,
though Tonus again kept him hon-
est throughout the race. Gajser
took the checkers five seconds
ahead of the Swiss rider. Seewer
was third, followed by Cairoli and
Julien Lieber (Kawasaki).
Cairoli struggled with his starts
in Russia and spent both motos
salvaging as many points as he
could. He ended up eighth over-
all, while Gajser, Tonus and See-
wer celebrated on the podium.
Gajser now leads the MXGP
championship by 13 points over
Cairoli. Championship contend-
ers Gautier Paulin (Yamaha) and
Clement Desalle (Kawasaki)
suffered DNFs due to crashes.
Desalle broke his leg in his crash
and will mostly likely be out for
the remainder of the season. He
Tim Gajser is the
championship
leader in the
MXGP class after
going 1-1 in Russia.
PHOTO: HONDA RACING
