Prestigious Maggiora awaits Team HRC

Tim Gajser and Ferruccio Zanchi are heading to the team’s “home” GP for what is the 10^th round of this 2024 MXGP World Championship. Maggiora, in northern Italy, is about an hour from the HRC European workshop and thus represents the easiest logistical challenge for the majority of the hard-working members of the team. For Gajser, it is around a seven-hour drive away, across the border from Slovenia, whilst Zanchi will be making the short drive up from his home near Florence in order to compete in what will be his first Italian round as an HRC rider.

Last time out in Latvia, Gajser reclaimed the red-plate after his one-two-two results at the rain-hit circuit in Kegums, and he’ll be hoping to keep hold of it after this weekend’s action, which will end the first-half of what has been an exciting and highly competitive championship thus far. The Honda CRF450R rider has won twice at the prestigious Maggiora in the past, in 2015 in the MX2 class and in 2022 on the way to winning his fifth world championship. Unfortunately, there is once again a threat of bad weather in the area over the weekend, so all the riders will need to be able to adapt to all conditions, however, this has been a strong point that Gajser has demonstrated throughout this 2024 campaign, and so he won’t be worried by whatever the weather throws at the circuit.

Whilst we have had two previous rounds on Italian soil (Sardegna and Trentino), Zanchi was unable to compete in those races due to injury and as such, Maggiora will be the first opportunity for the youngster to experience a gate-drop in front of his home fans. It will be a momentous occasion for the #73 and one he is looking forward to immensely, especially as he is in a good run of form and riding exceedingly well.

As always, the weekend will see the riders take to the track six times, with a free practice, timed practice and then qualification race on Saturday. The results of which score championship points and determine the gate-picks for the two GP-scoring motos on Sunday, which come after a Sunday morning warm-up session.