Marcus Pereira de Freitas the HRC General Manager for MXGP is very passionate about the performances of his riders and is also a good friend to five-time World motocross champion Tim Gajser. It is no secret, Gajser with his four MXGP titles and one MX2 has been more successful than any other rider in the last decade.

Amazingly, despite not winning a Grand Prix this year, Gajser came into the Spanish round of the championship last weekend, with the red plate. As much to do with consistent results and a desire to not lose ground on series leader, Jorge Prado, the Slovenian keeps pushing and fighting for podiums and major points.

For de Freitas, the goal is always to enjoy the racing and as Gajser always says, a happy Tim is a winning Tim. The HRC general manager for the MXGP efforts was excited heading into Lugo last Thursday afternoon.

“After a mud race like in Portugal,” de Freitas said. “There is always a big clean-up operation that needs to take place, to make sure everything is ready for the next race. Thankfully Lugo is close to Agueda, so there isn’t too much travel but there was still a lot of work and as always, our team have done an excellent job. Tim also did an excellent job last weekend and it is a nice thing to be applying a red plate to his Honda CRF450R for this weekend.”

Saturday proved to see the momentum from Spain continue and while Gajser didn’t get the qualification heat win, he showed enough to give the team a lot of confidence for the Sunday races.

“It was a good day for both Tim. Obviously, we know the levels that Tim can reach, but it is still good to see him fighting hard for the victory and keeping such a high level in all his races. We will keep helping him find that extra 1% and hopefully that will allow him to win the GP, something that he fully deserves.”

On the Sunday, it didn’t all go in favour of Gajser, but again, there were moments where you could see that the HRC rider was getting closer and closer to winning a Grand Prix in 2024 and also pushing Prado a little harder.

“It’s always good to go to new places and this Lugo track certainly provided a good challenge for all the riders. Tim rode really well in all the races over the weekend, but the points don’t show that and now we head to France motivated to go again. There are always such close margins in this sport and some weeks it goes for you, and sometimes you aren’t so lucky. Still, the championship is very close, and we have only done six rounds and there is plenty of racing to go, so we will keep working hard.”

Now onto France and another chance to fight for the biggest motocross championship in the World. De Freitas knows that it is a long championship and his team, and his rider will not slow down their momentum until that red plate is again screwed onto the front of the Honda factory machine.

Bavo Swijgers image