2016 MOTOCROSS OF NATIONS IN MAGGIORA

MXON: Third consecutive win for team France at the MXON

As always the 2016 FIM Motocross of Nations was a huge event, with some drama on the traditional and historical track of Maggiora (Italy). No less than 38 countries came and joined this national team race followed by 85000 excited spectators throughout the weekend.After their two successes in Latvia and France in the past editions, the French Team added a third consecutive win after one crazy final race.Winner of the qualifications on Saturday, the French Team was not the main favourite as many countries line up this year very strong teams. Leading the team’s classification after the second race, Team USA lost his most powerful rider just after the finish flag, when a rider jumped on race winner Jason Anderson after the finish line. The Americans had no more ‘joker’ as only five of the six results are retained for the final classification, and thanks to Cooper Webb performance Team USA was leading the competition before the last three laps of the last moto. But when Webb crashed with two laps to go, Team Netherlands became the new leader tight in the points with Team France! Thanks to a great performance of Romain Febvre who gained one position in the last lap, France finally beats Netherlands by one point and USA by four points!Back in the Swiss team alongside Jeremy Seewer and Valentin Guillod, Arnaud Tonus was the best representative of the team as Guillod got injured on Saturday. For what was his second appearance on a 450, Arnaud did two strong races finishing in fourth and eighth positions. “It was a good weekend for me, my second race on a 450. In the first race I got a good start and even though I had some arm pump I still managed to finish in fourth position; our bike was probably too aggressive for this kind of track, but the schedule for this special race is too tight to do much testing. In my second race my start was not as good; I found a good rhythm for fifteen minutes but then it was more difficult as I’m not used to the 450 and haven’t raced in Europe for two years. I really enjoyed racing on the 450; it suits my riding style pretty well and I’m happy with my second position overall in the Open class this weekend, “said the Scott Athlete who helped his team to finish sixth overall.

Final result:

1. France (Paturel, Febvre, Paulin), 29 points;

2.Netherlands (Bogers, Coldenhoff, Herlings), 30;

3.USA (Martin, Webb, Anderson), 33;

4.Belgium (Van Horebeek, Strijbos, Van Doninck), 36;

5.Italy (Bernardini, Cervellin, Cairoli), 44;

6.Switzerland (Seewer, Guillod, Tonus), 44