Will Kawasaki write history soon?
You cannot ignore it this year, Romain Febvre is having a very strong season in the MXGP. He is currently ranked second in the world championship, just six points behind Jeffrey Herlings. Will the Frenchman finally give Kawasaki another world title in mid-November?
Kawasaki is one of the smaller players in motocross but no less ambitious. Their last world title dates back to 2006 when Christophe Pourcel won the MX2 World Championship on the green machine. The brand has never won a title in the MXGP class.
Near despair
Since 2003, they have tried for the highest with Kenneth Gundersen, Andrew McFarlane, Tanel Leok, Sébastien Pourcel, Gareth Swanepoel, David Vuillemin, Xavier Boog, Jonathan Barragan, Gautier Paulin, Tommy Searle, Jeremy Van Horebeek, Steven Frossard, Tyla Rattray and Clément Desalle to go into the toughest class.
However, to no avail. Their story in the top flight almost seems like pure despair, but now light shines in the darkness. Since 2020, Romain Febvre has been recruited to make the impossible happen. Last year he missed the first two GPs due to an injury and then rode a fairly regular season with an outlier in Mantova where he won the race.
February 2.0
This year, however, Romain Febvre is performing “on a next level”. He is very regular, is on the podium at almost every GP and surprisingly won the Belgian GP in the heavy sand of Lommel. This year the MXGP World Championship is so exciting that no one dares to predict who will win the title. The fact is that the competitors are not allowed to make mistakes because Febvre is always nearby to punish them mercilessly.
With six GPs to go and 300 points still to be won, it is nail-biting to watch the outcome of this world championship. Starting with this Sunday because then there is the next race with the GP of Spain in intu Xanadú – Arroyomolinos. Romain Febvre knows how to become world champion because he already did it in 2015, back then on a Yamaha.
Furthermore, Febvre's alliance with Kawasaki is so strong that he agreed to remain 'in the green' for two more seasons, despite shifting operations from KRT to the IceOne team for 2022. “It's hard to say,” he noted when asked if the KX450F was the most formidable package he has ridden in MXGP and seven seasons in the class. “When I was with Yamaha their engine was good too."
"I think my level and physical readiness has increased and we had to adapt the bike to that,” he offered as an explanation for his form. “This week we made some changes that worked really well for me [in Lacapelle]. I'm really happy with the bike and that's why I signed with Kawasaki again for two years."
Febvre deflected pressure about his expectations for 2021 and the fact he can become Kawasaki's first world champion since 2006 and only the second in the four-stroke era. “The red plate means nothing right now because we are all so close to each other“he stated. “It's nice that there are three of us. Every weekend one of us can have the red plate! Hopefully it will last until the last race and we know that we have to do something extra in the last laps."
Kawasaki World Titles
- 1995 Stefan Everts 250cc
- 1996 Sebastien Tortelli 125cc
- 1998 Sebastien Tortelli 250cc
- 2002 Michaël Maschio 125cc
- 2006 Christophe Pourcel MX2
MXGP standings
- Jeffrey Herlings 460 p
- Romain Febvre 454 p
- Tim Gajser 450 p
- Jorge Prado 398 p
- Antonio Cairoli 387 p
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