Courtesy of Youthstream Media
Emil Weckman, current red plate holder, took his third win of the season in the Honda European 150 Championship at the MXGP of Germany today.
The young Finn took the Holeshot and soon settled into the lead but was unable to relax as the top eight riders were separated by the smallest of margins for the first half of the race. Yago Martinez had an unfortunate fall during the first lap; relegated to last place the speedy Spaniard had his work cut out to find his way through the pack.
For the first four laps, Weckman tried to put some time between him and those in second and third, Viking Lindstrom and Tim Edberg, but wasn’t able to pull away from them. Lindstrom looked like a potential challenge for the race victory but pushed a little too hard, which resulted in a fall that lost him six positions.
Eric Schwella, one of the German wildcard riders for this round, rode a strong race in front of his home crowd. Although he was in fourteenth place at the start of the race, he was extremely quick and was able to make his way through the pack and onto the rear wheel of second place Tim Edberg on the ninth lap. However, Schwella was unable to find his way past the young Swede in the final three laps.
Weckman has extended his championship lead over Albin Larsen and Jack Bintcliffe, who finished fifth and sixth respectively. Larsen now lies in second, one point ahead of Bintcliffe and Edberg. The second race of the weekend at Teutschenthal will start at 10hrs30 tomorrow.
Emil Weckman #25
“I took the first race a little bit careful because I want to win the championship and need every point. The track here has been pretty tough because the bumps and ruts are really big and there is just one line that is fast so if you get a bad start it is difficult to make places up. When I first rode the CRF150R I was two seconds quicker than on my old bike and now I think I am three, maybe four, seconds quicker. So I have improved but there are still three events after this one before the end of the season.”
Davy Dousselaere – Honda Europe off-road manager
“It was good to see that the first six were all within a very similar lap time with lots of close racing throughout the pack; there were quite a few battles for position during the entire race. The wildcard rider for this event, Eric Schwella from Germany did extremely well to come from fourteenth at the start of the race to finish third, and came very close to taking second from Tim Edberg. I am looking forward to see how tomorrow’s race will play out.”
ASC - Action Sports Connection 