at the line.
Vialle made his 450cc debut
as he returned to the MXGP
series with the Honda HRC
Petronas team. The French rider
opened the weekend with a win
in the qualifying race and led
laps during both of Sunday's
motos, finishing the weekend in
third overall.
"It feels really nice to be back
racing a GP," Vialle said. "I didn't
know what to expect coming
into the first round because it's
been a while since I raced here,
and the level in the 450 class is
very high. I had a good feeling
with the bike all weekend, and
my starts were good, which is
important in this class. The first
race was strong, and I stayed
close to Jeffrey, but in the
second one I lost a bit of energy
before the restart and made a
couple of mistakes."
Former Honda rider Tim Ga
-
jser finished fourth overall with
6-3
scores in his debut with the
Yamaha Factory team.
"We came here to learn, and
while it probably wasn't the
smoothest weekend, we made
the most of the circumstances,"
Gajser said. "There are definitely
positives to take, especially from
the second moto, and I felt like
we improved in every session,
which is encouraging."
Lucas Coenen rounded out the
top five with 4-6 finishes. Ruben
Fernandez finished sixth ahead
of Maxime Renaux, Andrea
Adamo, Thibault Benistant and
Pauls Jonass.
MX2
Simon Laengenfelder began
his MX2 title defense in Argen
-
tina with a clean sweep of both
motos.
He made his way to the
front during race one and passed
for the lead around MX2 rookie
Janis Reisulis on lap six. From
there, it was smooth sailing
for the defending champ as he
clinched the win by four seconds
over his KTM teammate and
qualifying race winner, Sacha
Coenen.
Laengenfelder fired back with
even more aggression in race
two as he charged through the
field. The German rider pushed
Guillem Farres off track to take
third and then set his sights on
the race leader, Liam Everts.
On lap 10 of 16, Laengenfelder
made his bid for the top spot
and overtook Everts after a short
back-and-forth battle. He held a
slight advantage for the remain
-
ing laps and went on to take a
dominant 1-1
victory.
Two of the Triumph Factory
Racing machines put themselves
on the podium, with Guillem
Farres and Camden McLellan
rounding out the top three over
-
all. Farres' 3-4 put him second in
one
of his best season openers,
while McLellan second-place fin-
ish in race two bumped him up in
the rankings.
CN
MXGP (Top 5)
1. Jeffrey Herlings (Hon) 1-1
2. Romain Febvre (Kaw) 3-2
3. Tom Vialle (Hon) 2-4
4. Tim Gajser (Yam) 6-3
5. Lucas Coenen (KTM) 4-6
MX2 (Top 5)
1. Simon Laengenfelder (KTM) 1-1
2. Guillem Farres (Tri) 3-4
3. Camden McLellan (Tri) 6-2
4. Liam Everts (Hus) 7-3
5. Janis Reisulis (Yam) 4-6
VOLUME 63 ISSUE 10 MARCH 10, 2026 P29
Tom Vialle returned
to the MXGP
Championship and
rounded out the MXGP
podium in third.
