The Fiat Professional Fullback MXGP of Lombardia hosted tough racing and the EMX classes were no different. The toughest riders in the European Championships proved to be Monster Energy Kawasaki Racing Team’s Morgan Lesiardo in EMX250, IceOne Husqvarna Racing’s Mikkel Haarup in EMX125 Presented by FMF Racing and Brad Anderson in EMX300 Presented by FMF Racing.
EMX250 race 1 was a dominant performance by Monster Energy Kawasaki Racing Team’s Morgan Lesiardo, only the second race win of the season in which he leads points in. Honda Redmoto’s Mathys Boisrame ran 2nd 13 of 15 laps before the scorching heat took the rider out of the race.
Meanwhile Italian Nicholas Lapucci started 4th dropped to 5th but then put in a strong second half of the race to finish 2nd. Another Italian, Yamaha SM Action’s Simone Furlotti was a hard charger as he came from 8th to 3rd.
Nearly as impressive was F&H Racing Team’s Ruben Fernandez who took 4th after starting lap 1 in 7th. Sahkar Racing KTM’s Jago Geerts was having a stellar performance battling into the top 3 but had a huge get off in the roller section. Geerts remounted his KTM but in 32nd but would finish 26th and one lap down.
Race 2 started with a holeshot from Simone Furlotti who held the lead to the finish and the race 1 winner, Lesiardo, started 8th. Lesiardo worked his Kawasaki into 2nd after going back and forth for 4th with iFly JK Racing’s Ken Bengtson. Though Bengston who took 7th in race 1 came home 4th in race 2 to score 5th overall.
Lapucci started race 2 in 16th, finished 8th, and took 4th overall after his 2nd in race 1. While Fernandez improved on his race 1 result taking 3rd in both the race and the overall.
EMX125 Presented by FMF Racing was taken over by IceOne Husqvarna Racing’s Mikkel Haarup. The Dane took the lead in race 1 6 laps through and never looked back winning by 34 seconds. Race 2 Haarup started 4th but made his way forward eventually to the lead on the 10th of 15 laps. Haarup’s unbeatable 1-1 performance gained him 14 points on the championship leader.
Gianluca Facchetti had cosistent finishes in adverse conditions. Facchetti started race 1 in 3rd then gained one spot on Isak Gifting to finish second. Gifting led the first 6 laps of race 1 before dropping to 3rd by the checkered flag.
Race 2 was similar for the pair where instead Faccheti led the first 10 laps then dropped to 2nd while Gifting started and finish third securing the same spots in the overall.
BUD Racing Monster Energy’s Brian Strubhart Moreau also had identical race finishes. Moreau was 4th the entirety of race 1. Though the #225 had a better start in race 2 a fall in a corner dropped him back to the 4th spot once again.
Rounding out the top 5 was Kini KTM Junior Racing’s Rene Hofer. The Austrian placed 6th in race 1 even after a 12th place start. Race 2 saw a slightly better start of 7th and finish of 5th resulting in 5th overall.
EMX300 Presented by FMF Racing race 1 was a battle between GL12 Racing’s James Dunn and Mike Kras. However points leader Brad Anderson split the teammates. Dunn managed to take the race win followed by Anderson and 2016 Champion Mike Kras.
Behind the top 3 was Belgian Kenny Vandueren. Starting 10th he passed a handful of riders at time, 3 on lap 2, 2 on lap 8, and 1 more on lap 10 to finish 4th. In race 2 Vandueren’s position changed from lap to lap making leaps forward then falling back before finish 2 spot better then his 10th place start with 8th. The 4-8 scores were enough to take 5th overall.
The lone Husqvarna in the top ten group of KTM’s was the #98 of Erik Willem’s. 5th in race 1 after falling to 8th early in the race was a strong rebound. Willems would find 5th again in race 2 after a 7th place start before being passed on lap 8 and ending up 6th.
For the GL12 Racing riders of Dunn and Kras race 2 was more of a struggle. Dunn would still manage a 3rd after a testing 17th place start but Kras wouldn’t have the same level of success in coming through the field starting 14th and finishing 7th.
While Dunn took 2nd overall and Kras 3rd, it was Brad Anderson a top the podium with a solid 2-1 finish scoring 47 points, 2 more than Dunn’s 1-3 would give.
