Everts On 2026 MXGP

While we can all sit throughout this off-season and remember a brilliant MXGP championship, starting at the beautiful country of Argentina and ending some six months later in a just as beautiful country as Australia. It sounds like a dream come true, however 2026 is looking so much better.

With Tim Gajser and Jeffrey Herlings both changing teams for next year, Lucas Coenen and Romain Febvre set to reignite their amazing battles of 2025 and Kay De Wolf, coming to the MXGP class, 2026 just reads excitement, drama and huge fights.

The greatest Grand Prix rider of all time, Stefan Everts might know a thing or two about making the most of a career and he looks at 2026 as something very enthralling and he names the young guns to surprise the older, more experienced racers.

“Sure, and with Kay moving up next year,” Everts said. “Which makes it so exciting. I think its going to be tough for the older guys, to have these young guys moving up. We saw it with Lucas how he put Tim under pressure in Switzerland, and we saw what happened with Tim, he made this huge mistake. These young guys are putting the level up. We were in Valkenswaard (International race two weeks ago), and we saw Kay and Liam were just following Jeffrey the whole time. Jeffrey is normally the best sand rider, but he couldn’t pull away from Kay and Liam. These guys are not even in the class yet.”

We all know that many of the champions of the last few decades, have won their world championship in a known environment. Be it Herlings with KTM, Gajser with Honda, Prado with KTM/GasGas, or Febvre with Kawasaki, all these men won in teams that they had been with for some time.

“Its going to be difficult for both Tim and Jeffrey. Kay will be on that top level; I am sure of that. Tim and Jeffrey, swapping teams and bikes, it can turn out well, or not well and that is the gamble they took and maybe they needed the new challenge. It is cool to see them on different bikes and how they will adapt to it. Being on the same team, its normal motivation can go down and being on a new team brings new motivation and maybe it is the right time for them to make this change. We will know in one years’ time.”

For Everts, maybe the most exciting thing is the change for five-time world motocross champion, Herlings. Going from KTM and moving to a brand-new team will add a new dimension to the MXGP championship and something that could turn out to get the motocross world watching Grand Prix motocross more than ever.

“Sure, it’s a massive thing, a huge change. I mean, even for Tim going to Yamaha is a big thing and cool to see. It creates a new interest for the fans and media to see the first pictures of the year, the first race, the first Grand Prix. For everyone it is exciting and it’s a gamble for the riders and the teams. If you see what happened with Jorge in America on Kawasaki, it can end badly and that did for sure.”

So, lets sit back, enjoy the winter and be prepared when the best motocross riders in the world head to the opening round in February and make us all want to be at the races.

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