Clément Desalle takes the lead of the championship

 

The Uddevalla event, in Sweden, opened the second half of the World Motocross Championship season on 1 July. In front of 22,000 spectators, the riders had to fight it out on a difficult and muddy circuit in changing and damp weather conditions. So Clément Desalle did remarkably well. Riding a Suzuki RM-Z450 for team Suzuki Rockstar Energy, supported technically by Motul, the Belgian rider had a slight fright in the trials with a bump to his knee, fortunately of no consequence. He then won the two races with brio, imposing his pace on a jostling pack, which allows him to take the lead of the championship. 'I was confident and could do what I wanted with the bike', he explained. 'My team is so professional and so experienced that I owe it huge thanks.' The other rider of the team,  Tanel Leok, also had a very satisfactory result, with a 6th and a 4th place in the two races, one of his best results of the year. Yet the Estonian rider still wanted more, stating: 'That's not bad, but my riding was mediocre. If it wasn't for stupid mistakes I could have been closer to the leaders.' Which is encouraging for the next races.

In MX2, the team was slightly less lucky, with several collisions and falls for Petar Petrov, who came 18th despite excellent times in qualifying: 'I had the speed to rank among the top ten. It's a pity', he regretted. Nor was Harri Kullas any luckier: he made a mess of the qualifyings and, in race one, fell and twisted his knee which forced him to abandon.

In any case the team is raring to go with Desalle's leading position and intends to do all it can for him to keep that place. The teams will meet next time in Latvia for the tenth round of the championship on 15 July. 

MX1 Championship Standings
01// Clément Desalle, Suzuki, 348 pts - Motul
2// Antonio Cairoli, KTM, 345 pts
3// Christophe Pourcel, Kawasaki, 336 pts
09// Tanel Leok, Suzuki, 201 pts - Motul

Photo credit: suzuki-racing.com