DThe Motorcross of Nations is a good week behind us. We enjoyed it. Things keep popping up that caught our attention. For example, there was the action around Save The Motocross or should we say Co2 Zero from now on. The ministers shone on stage Joke Schauvliege en Philippe Muyters as well as Prime Minister Chris Peters by their absence. Fortunately, Crown Prince Philippe of Belgium had arrived and he could see how infectiously the youngsters danced onto the stage with their trees. To Mr. Walter Cremers, the representative for sports was presented with a symbolic check for 1500 trees. This action was largely lost on the general public because the sound system was inadequate and only reached the people in front of the stage.
The original Kid and the Prince.
There was plenty of noise in Lommel. The various bunches of “bananas” ensured that the commentary was largely audible. The organization (Geboers & Youthstream) missed out Leon Van Gestel too Francis Magnanou (Bercy, Dakar….) and Roger Warren (Eurosport) to Lommel. The Italian GP speaker was added on Sunday. This also makes the MXON a truly international event. But it is difficult to really “get into it” with four people. Now the emphasis was more on information than info-tainement.
There was no Dutch commentary during the final round. Léon took care of the ceremony around Red De Motorcross just before the start. He was then invited by Eric Geboers to meet Prince Philip. Leon Van Gestel: “I'm not really a monarchist, but I was still happy that I could meet the prince. Once the greeting was over, the prince proposed to follow the final series from the princely box, together with mayor Van Velthoven and FIM chairman Vito Ippolito en Joel Robert. I wisely positioned myself on the side of the lodge, near security. By the way, it was already too late to walk back to the commentary tower, because after the final series the ceremony immediately started on stage.”
The ceremony itself was a series of emotions. The Americans were of course not so cheerful, the Belgians downright dejected. But “Die Manschaft” gave cotton a great result. So much so that the speaker couldn't even be heard above the cheering. He just let things rage. But when the Germans were crowned winners, all hell broke loose again. Nagl, Roczen en Skipper became world famous in Germany overnight. It's also nice how the German delegation included Father Nagl in the tribute. There are some strange people walking around among the audience. On Saturday night, the intersection at the campsite was occupied by a large group of drunken supporters. The intersection was simply littered with broken glasses. On Sunday afterwards we also saw strange scenes. Everything that was not secured was taken. We saw someone walking towards the campsite with a four-metre long billboard. A little further on we saw a similar fact, but someone from Youthstream called the "gentlemen" to order. They also appeared to be indignant.
