MOTOCROSS
FIM/MONSTER ENERGY MOTOCROSS OF NATIONS
MOTOCROSS OF NATIONS / SEPTEMBER 28-29, 2019
TT CIRCUIT ASSEN / ASSEN, HOLL AND
P72
couldn't put it together this year,
suffering two late-race mechani-
cals and ending up fifth overall,
tied on points with Team USA.
Team USA
(68 points, 5-8-13-17-25)
Things were looking pretty
good for Team USA after the Sat-
urday qualifiers. The team landed
third overall thanks mainly to the
dominant performance by MX2
racer Justin Cooper in his quali-
fier. But it all went south about
19 seconds into the first moto of
the day on Sunday. That's when
Cooper, who was trying to pass
teammate Jason Anderson in a
fast section of sand rollers, lost
his balance and fell into Ander-
son. They both went down very
hard. Cooper soldiered on to
25th in the moto without a clutch
(his lever broke off) and raced the
next moto with his left hand swol-
len (but ended up 29th, which
finally got its first-ever MXoN over-
all victory on their own turf in front
of their home fans. And Cold-
enhoff went 1-1 again. Herlings
went 2-4 in his two motos, and
their MX2 teammate, Vlaanderen,
went 10-10 in his two motos. They
could've kept all six of their moto
scores and still won by almost 20
points!
Team France
(68 points, 5-6-16-18-23)
Team France's luck finally ran
out in The Netherlands. It had
never won the MXoN before their
first-ever win in 2014 in Latvia, but
won all five since then coming
into this year's event. But France
will have numbers 16 (MXGP),
17 (MX2) and 18 (Open) at the
Motocross of Nations in Ernee,
France.
Team Netherlands
(18 points, 1-1-2-4-10)
The Netherlands probably
should've won the Motocross of
Nations last year at RedBud when
Team members Jeffrey Herlings
and Glenn Coldenhoff won all
three motos. However, their MX2
(250cc) pilot, Calvin Vlaanderen,
suffered an eye injury in the first
race and was medically excluded
from returning to racing. But after
three MXoN second-place fin-
ishes in a row, the Netherlands
MX2 World
Champion Jorge
Prado made his
450cc debut
for Team Spain.
He put together
strong 3-7 results.