Team New Zealand qualifies 5th overall at MXoN
Sunday 27 September: In the MXGP Ben Townley was 2nd, in MX2 Kayne Lamont had a DNF and in the Open Cody Cooper was 8th.
In MXoN qualifying you drop the worst result result, so 2 + 8 = 5th. Kayne Lamont was 24th in the Timed Practice. Chris Ritchie said the bike seized. Read on MNZ Facebook page "Discovered fractured frame on Kayne's bike after practice. There wasn't time to change the engine so ran the practice bike. Unfortunately it seized a lap and a half into the race."
Here is the full qualifying report from Youthstream.
Flawless day for France
ERNEE (France), 26 September 2015 - There is no off-road motorsport event bigger or better than the Monster Energy FIM Motocross of Nations and the atmosphere and racing here today in Ernée has added even more fuel to the fire as Team France’s Gautier Paulin, Marvin Musquin and Romain Febvre, the defending champions and home team, dominated all three races to qualify on pole as a perfect start to their MXoN campaign.
MXGP
Taking us right back to the unforgettable FIM Motocross of Nations that took place at this exact track in 2005, New Zealand’s Ben Townley burst out of the gate for the holeshot ahead of Sweden’s Fillip Bengtsson and Team Belgium’s Ken De Dycker.
Team France’s Gautier Paulin started around fourth
and had the fans in frenzy almost immediately when he set a lap time 1.2
seconds faster than anyone else out on track on lap 4. Despite his
blistering fast pace, it took the Frenchman a few laps to get around De
Dycker but eventually he got the job done.
The flying number 1 of Paulin then pulled the pin and hunted down
Townley for the lead, which he easily took since lappers got in the way
of Townley. Paulin checked out to win by 11 seconds over Townley.
Team Great Britain had luck on their side during balloting this morning when they drew number 1 for first pick at the gate but Shaun Simpson didn’t see any of it when he was robbed of third after being landed on by a back marker on the final lap. Meanwhile Team USA’s Justin Barcia took advantage of Simpson’s misfortune after passing a fast fading De Dycker and finished third.
Team Germany’s Max Nagl had a spill on the second
lap but was quick to regroup and bought it home for fourth while De
Dycker managed to hold on for fifth.
MXGP Qualifying Heat top ten: 1.
Gautier Paulin (FRA, Honda), 24:12.728; 2. Ben Townley (NZL, Honda),
+0:11.703; 3. Justin Barcia (USA, Yamaha), +0:15.272; 4. Maximilian Nagl
(GER, Husqvarna), +0:18.237; 5. Ken de Dycker (BEL, KTM), +0:30.278; 6.
Evgeny Bobryshev (RUS, Honda), +0:39.429; 7. Jose Butron (ESP, KTM),
+0:50.594; 8. Filip Bengtsson (SWE, Honda), +0:53.112; 9. Todd Waters
(AUS, Husqvarna), +1:02.719; 10. Priit Ratsep (EST, Honda), +1:04.952
MX2
With Gautier Paulin getting Team France off to the best start they could hope for, it was down to Marvin Musquin
to keep the ball rolling. Musquin didn’t let the team down; he pulled
the holeshot and checked out for a easy race win ahead of Team USA’s Jeremy Martin who rode to a lonely and unchallenged second.
Team Great Britain’s luck changed in the blink of an eye when Max Anstie
made a mistake coming out of the 180 before the downhill triple,
stalled the bike and was landed on while trying to bump start it.
Meanwhile Team Austria’s Pascal Rauchenecker was the lethal dark horse in MX2 as he rode in third place for the majority of the race before Team Switzerland’s Jeremy Seewer
found some extra drive and out dragged him for the spot. Seewer pulled a
reasonable gap while Rauchenecker was forced to hold off the hard
charging Belgian Julien Lieber, who eventually rounded out the top five.
MX2 Qualifying Heat top ten: 1. Marvin Musquin (FRA,
KTM), 24:03.050; 2. Jeremy Martin (USA, Yamaha), +0:04.798; 3. Jeremy
Seewer (SUI, Suzuki), +0:59.410; 4. Pascal Rauchenecker (AUT, KTM),
+1:08.214; 5. Julien Lieber (BEL, Yamaha), +1:10.541; 6. Jorge Zaragoza
(ESP, Honda), +1:11.143; 7. Harri Kullas (EST, Husqvarna), +1:12.702; 8.
Nick Kouwenberg (NED, Honda), +1:21.290; 9. Toshiki Tomita (JPN,
Honda), +1:26.685; 10. Henry Jacobi (GER, KTM), +1:27.690
OPEN
Team USA’s young gun Cooper Webb pulled a mega holeshot with Team Australia’s Dean Ferris, Team Slovenia’s MX2 World Champion Tim Gajser and Team France’s MXGP World Champion Romain Febvre in tow.
Gajser passed Ferris one lap in but threw it away half a lap later
when he got cross-rutted on one of the steep down hills and crashed.
Then it was Febvre who made light work of the Australian who later
curbed a rut in the latter stages of the race and binned it too.
With Webb and Febvre out front, the Open class was clearly a two
horse race as the duo held nothing back in their battle for the lead.
After bashing bars for half of the race, which had the massively
enthusiastic French fans going ballistic, a small mistake from Webb saw
Febvre make the pass and gap it to make it a perfect day for the
defending champions, Team France.
A super smooth Webb took a convincing second while Team Belgium’s Jeremy Van Horebeek and Team The Netherlands Glenn Coldenhoff bickered the entire moto and finished third and fourth in that order.
Team Great Britain’s Dean Wilson was slightly
deflated by the bad luck his teammates Shaun Simpson and Max Anstie
faced, but soldiered on to round out the top five.
OPEN Qualifying Race top ten: 1. Romain Febvre (FRA,
Yamaha), 23:57.211; 2. Cooper Webb (USA, Yamaha), +0:04.255; 3. Jeremy
Van Horebeek (BEL, Yamaha), +0:37.415; 4. Glenn Coldenhoff (NED,
Suzuki), +0:40.987; 5. Dean Wilson (GBR, KTM), +0:41.580; 6. Dennis
Ullrich (GER, Suzuki), +0:48.674; 7. Dean Ferris (AUS, Husqvarna),
+1:05.787; 8. Cody Cooper (NZL, Honda), +1:13.566; 9. Tanel Leok (EST,
Kawasaki), +1:15.185; 10. Günter Schmidinger (AUT, Honda), +1:33.317
QUALIFYING OVERALL
Team France will be on pole after winning all three Qualifying races today. Team USA are the clear cut runners up while Team Belgium round out the top three. Solid performances by the Germans put them in fourth followed by Team New Zealand in fifth.
1st France 2 points
2nd USA 4
3rd Belgium 8
4th Germany 10
5th New Zealand 10
6th The Netherlands 12
7th Spain 13
8th Austria 14
9th Switzerland 15
10th Estonia 16
11th Australia 16 (Dean Ferris was 7th in front of Cody Cooper and
Todd Waters 9th. Luke Clout, who replaced the injured Jay Wilson was
was 24th)
12th Great Britain 16
13th Sweden 21
14th Italy 26
15th Ireland 27