MXGP – Five Rounds In

With the 2026 MXGP Championship five rounds in, you just know that fireworks are about to happen, when we arrive at round six in France in around a months’ time. As teenager, Lucas Coenen of the Red Bull KTM factory team leads the series points on 231-, and five-time world motocross champion, Jeffrey Herlings of the Honda HRC Petronas factory effort, just four points back on 227, those two will be ready to battle it out at the hard pack of Lacapelle Marival.

For Coenen, who has shown ridiculous speed in a handful of races so far this season, he was more than happy with getting out of the Trentino round and move forward. With the red plate attached to his KTM, he knows that he is still in the driver’s seat, and he knows that he will need to be well prepared for France, if he wants to battle Herlings, Tim Gajser and Tom Vialle again.

“Overall,” Coenen said. “I’m happy that I’m healthy and fit. I didn’t have high expectations for this track because it’s not really [suited to] my style. Two crashes in the first race and I had to pass a lot of people. In the second I tried to settle in and keep cool but paid for that little mistake. At least I had good pace, so I have to be happy and look forward.”

Of course, Herlings already has five world titles to his name, three in MX2 and two in MXGP, but his move to Honda has given the always motivated Herlings, even more motivation and drive to get that world title number six. You can see from the body language, that Herlings is enjoying his time on the red machine.

“At the last race at Arco,” Herlings said. “We had over 80 people from Honda there. Our team picture was insane! With all of the technicians flying over from Japan, I do personally think Honda has the biggest budget in MXGP. They come out there with five trucks and all these vans and all these people. Quite simply, when a team has the maybe the most budget, they’ll be able to give you a good bike and good people around you. That’s what they do over here in Europe. It’s quite special.”

Without question though, the bright light from Trentino was the race victory by another five-time world motocross champion, Tim Gajser, who swapped his red Honda for a blue Yamaha. It has taken the Slovenian some time to get the right feel for the Yamaha, but in Italy a couple of weeks ago, the feeling was victory in the second race in Trentino and he loved it.

“I’m almost speechless,” Gajser said. “I’m super happy with this result. Coming into the weekend I knew it was going to be a difficult one because I was still in a lot of pain after the crash last week in Riola, but I gave everything I had. The fans really helped push me on, especially in the second Race, so a huge thank you to everyone who travelled here and supported me. I also want to thank the whole team and everyone around me, from the physios to the staff, because we worked so hard during the week to get me ready to race. It makes this result even more special. Now we have a break, which gives me time to recover properly, and then we’ll be ready to go again in four weeks.”

While you need to add the names of Tom Vialle, Maxime Renaux and defending MXGP champion, Romain Febvre to riders possible of winning at the French Grand Prix, we all know, that the young Belgian will at least have these two five time champions wanting to put a little pain on him, and create their chance for a sixth world championship to become not just a dream, but a reality.