FIM W orld Cham p ion s h ip Motocros s S e r ie s
Round 4 : M o t oc ro ss C ir.cu it Horensbergdam
(Above) Iri shman Gordon Crockard
finally arrested Mickael Pichon's
dominance of the 250cc class, scoring
a w in at t he wet Be lgian round. The
CAS Honda ri der is second In the
points standings.
(Left) Apparently, Stefan Everts is fully
recove red and accustomed to the
Yam aha four-stroke. In what many
thought was t he be st race of the day,
th e Belgia n took his third w in in f our
ro unds over Joel Sm ets.
By
G EOFF M EYER
P HOTO S BY R A Y A RCHER
GENK, BELGIUM, AP 29
RIL
T
hro ugho ut the first few ro und s of
th e 250 c c MX GP c irc uit , Irish man Gordon Crocka rd saw so mething
not ma ny ot hers did: Many (incl uding
this publica tion ) were calling Coro na
Suzuki's Mic ka e l Picho n perfe ct , a s
th e Frenchman ha d won the . first
three rou nds in co nv incing fashion,
b ut Croc ka rd swore the F re n c h m a n
was s howing signs of weakne s s . It
wo uld be tempti ng to sing le out the
CAS Honda rider as a little crazy , as
he tra iled in the po ints and ha d be e n
left for dea d by Pic hon at the Aus tr a lian GP j us t two weeks ea rl ier
(t hough he d id put up a fight at the
fi rst two) . But b a c k in E ur o p e ,
Crockard backed up his words with a
stellar performance , winni ng th e
quarter -lite r class a t the first of three
GPs to be held th is yea r in Be lgium .
As Crockard scraped the m ud off his
boots afte r defeating Pich on a t th e
we t Ho r e n s b e rg d a m circuit , it
became appare nt th a t Pichon may
just be a littl e m ore brittle tha n previo us ly th ou g ht, and Cro c kar d a little
less crazy.
22
MAY 9 , 200 1 •
c
ue
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"He had said some st upid th ings
after his wins in S pain a nd Ho llan d ,"
Crocka rd s a id to th e 25,OOO-strong
crowd. "He wa s sa ying he wa s sur pri s ed he had won. I knew at t h a t
moment he was beatable. I tho ug ht to
my self, 'What a weak th ing to say ,'
and I felt that he was mine for the
ta king . I let him go in Austra lia, [so l I
rea lly had to be at him here; ot herwise
he was going to get more confident,
and then we [would have] ha d prob lem s."
"I'm surp rised he beat me," Pich on
admitted . "I' ve been in g o od form ,
and I have fel t confident for sure. I
know now th a t I m us t s tay fo c used
a nd wor k harder. The cham pionship
is a long one, and I have to keep th e
mome nt um on m y s ide."
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