Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
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MOTOCROSS FIM MOTOCROSS WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP ROUND 18 / SEPTEMBER 10-11, 2016 GLEN HELEN RACEWAY / SAN BERNARDINO, CALIFORNIA P96 Two-time AMA 250MX National Champ Jeremy Martin spent the last few AMA Nationals on the side- lines as he dealt with some injuries and an illness that he had been fight- ing all season long, then made his GEICO Honda debut at the Glen Helen MXGP finale. Although he's still learning the bike and team, and they're still learning about him and what he likes, he was fast all weekend. However, he did have his share of trouble. He and the team made some changes to the bike from Saturday to Sunday, but then Martin didn't get a chance to try the changes out in practice. "I was a little bummed I had a revised schedule of the whole event and what time every- thing was supposed to run," Martin said. "I didn't think practice was un- til 10:20 this morning, so I left the hotel around nine and I got phone calls coming down the highway like, 'Dude, practice is going on!' So I just pinned it in my Danger Ranger and I was driving like 95. As soon as I got here, everyone was finishing up practice, so I was like, 'All right! We'll just test the settings out in the first moto!'" As it turned out, the set- tings were in the right direction, and Martin managed to go 2-2 on the day even though he admitted he hasn't been training all that much since he dropped out of the AMA champion- ship after Washougal. Yoshimura held a small press con- ference at Glen Helen where they showed off a limited edition Tim Ga- jser signature exhaust system. It's a very pretty part, with dyed-red Kevlar woven in to the carbon-fiber mufflers. "I just want to say thank you very much," Gajser said. "The exhaust is just unbelievable. I re- ally enjoy riding with it. I hope in the coming season we can do even more. We are now two times a world champion and I'm so proud of ev- eryone. Thank you very much for all of your sup- port." There will only be 24 of the exhausts built for sale to the public, and only 23 of them will be sold through Yoshimura, as exhaust- system number 13— Jessy Nelson's racing number—was signed by Gajser to be auctioned off by the Road 2 Recovery Founda- tion to help Nelson with his recovery from a spinal-cord injury suffered at the Unadilla MX National. Speaking of Tim Gajser, his plans are to return to the USA after the Mo- tocross of Nations in order to com- pete in the 2016 Monster Energy Cup in Las Vegas. He also hopes to race the first few rounds of the 2016 Monster Energy/AMA Supercross Championship starting at Anaheim 1 in January before heading back to Europe to defend his World Cham- pionship. Honda's Gautier Paulin doesn't have his MXGP contract signed for 2017. He says he doesn't know if he's going to return with Honda or not, but that he should know more in the next few weeks. But Tommy Searle will likely be returning to action with the Dixon Racing team. We caught up with Brett Metcalfe at the MXGP on Saturday. He had a huge crash near the end of the 2016 Canadian MX National Champion- ships and was forced out of the se- ries, but he says he wants to keep racing, and that his dream gig would be to find a spot on a good team to race just the AMA Nationals, but no Supercross, i n 2017. Monster Energy Yamaha's Romain Febvre, the 2015 MXGP World Champion who won here last year at Glen Helen, didn't have as much success this year. He struggled with mechanical problems with his works YZ450FM and had to pull out of moto one all together. He came back in moto two, only to fall in a slow turn while running in the top five that cost him four positions. He ended up 15 th overall and fourth in the champion- ship. He missed a few rounds earlier in the season with a concussion. Briefly... Romain Febvre didn't have the magic this year at Glen Helen.