Round 6 – World Championship –
Mallory Park, Great Britain - 01 June 2008

Simpson fourth on home soil

The KTM UK MX team seized fourth position overall thanks to Shaun Simpson’s efforts in the MX2 class at Mallory Park for the British Grand Prix and the first of their two home rounds of the 2008 FIM Motocross World Championship. The sixth event of fifteen in the international campaign took place in front of 41,000 spectators undeterred by a ceiling of grey cloud.

Mallory Park faced a busy inauguration as a world championship venue and for the most part the permanent facilities of the historic site coped well with the presence of a vast and new 1600m layout of jumps and curves alongside the asphalt. The track itself combined huge leaps with a technical terrain even if overtaking opportunities were relatively scarce, placing extra emphasis on the starts.
Simpson began the weekend in fine form with a strong second position in the second MX2 qualification heat. The Scot thus captured a career-best entry of fourth position into the start gate for the two 35 minute and 2 lap motos. He then set the fastest time in Sunday morning warm-up.

A bright start in the first race saw him trading track space with works KTM riders Tyla Rattray and Tommy Searle. The duel with Searle for second place was particularly intense as the three Austrian machines had broken away from the rest of the pack, but a mistake on the slow right hand corner before the pit-lane meant that Simpson lost the two of the other factory motorcycles and ran a lonely third for long periods. A surging Antonio Cairoli eventually forced the 20 year old down to 4th.
In the second outing Simpson again broke away as part of the top five but felt the pace of the leaders in the latter stages of the sprint across a rougher surface and collected 7th position for a final finish of 4th overall. Both savouring and learning about his new profile as one of the protagonists in the MX2 class after a glut of decent results and form, Simpson was also buoyed to see that he is poised on the fringe of the top four in the world championship standings, just 2 points from Nico Aubin.

" It was a pretty good weekend and if someone had offered me 4th and 7th before the GP then I would have taken those, especially getting to within two points of Aubin and fourth place in the world championship,” he said. “It was the first time I have come into the British Grand Prix with people expecting me to do well and I enjoyed the experience; the crowd were mega. It was a real shame about that slip in the first moto as I was matching Tommy’s pace and it was good to be up there with the guys going for the title. In the second race I just faded a bit in the second half and that was disappointing. Still there are positives to take away from today and plenty again to learn from.”

James Noble obtained his best qualification position of the season on Saturday and entered the gate 12th, as the top British rider in the MX1 class and ahead of world championship leader David Philippaerts. The Englishman seemed to enjoy the track and fed from the buzz of his home Grand Prix to push for his best results of the year after coming back from injury in spring. Noble was unlucky not to take 12th in Moto1 when a small error on the final lap saw him relegated by one position to 13th. In the second race, like Simpson, the track and its demands took a toll but the British championship favourite kept consistent for 10th; his highest classification of 2008.

“I’m pleased overall. I was nearer the pace of the top ten. I made a small mistake in the first one and lost 12th place on the last lap. I was 10th in the second one and felt a bit tired towards the end but I did not want to crash. I wanted two reasonably good finishes and to take some confidence and that’s what I did. The track was OK. It is hard to please everyone. There were a lot of people and I think it is certainly the best Grand Prix of the year so far.”

The team will pause again for a week now with the Grand Prix of France at St Jean d’Angely taking place in a fortnight and representing the seventh round of the campaign.