Italian MX1 world champion Antonio Cairoli and Russian Evgeny Bobryshev are fast building up for a good start to the MX1 motocross world championships as they finished top of the podium at round two of the Italian Motocross Championships in Faenza this week.

Cairoli had a good start in the first race but was bothered with arm pump as the race progressed.

“My arm got quite hard but I tried to relax and shake it out and in the end I managed second,” he said later. The second race was more dramatic for the KTM factory rider. He got into a tangle with several other riders at the start and found himself right back at around 20th.

He made one of his typical charges and managed to work his way right back to the front, slipping past Yamaha’s David Philippaerts in the final corner to claim third place.

The 2-3 result gave him 180 championship points, trailing eventual overall Elite Class winner Bobryshev (Honda, 3-1) by 20 points to wrap up a race day that he said was “quite satisfying” overall.

While Cairoli’s KTM team-mate Max Nagl had a DNF in the first race, he put on a great performance to finish second in the second race, commenting that the wet track had dried out well by race two leaving some nice lines.

Nagl, always a demon at the start, went very close to getting the holeshot in race two but made a small mistake in the straight to be third in the first corner. He went on to secure second at the chequered flag. Nagl is still making the transition from the 450 SX-F to the new 350 SX-F bike and said at the close of the day he was very satisfied.

“Today I had good starts and I had the speed. I sometimes had some problems with shifting but that’s only because I’m getting used to the new bike and adjusting my riding style to suit it.”

In the MX2 class, Frenchman Gautier Paulin (Yamaha) won the day narrowly from 38-year-old Italian Alessio Chiodi (Suzuki), while Czech Republic rider Peter Smitka (TM) took the third step of the podium.

The World Championships kick off in Sevlievo, Bulgaria in the first weekend in April.

Meanwhile, in the under-17 class at Faeza, there were two riders featuring who will be familiar to Kiwi fans, Samuele Bernadini and Jeremy Seewer, both of whom raced at the Junior World Championships in Taupo in 2009.

Italian Bernadini won the day on his KTM, while Swiss rider Seewer took his KTM to third overall.

© Andy McGechan, www.BikesportNZ.com

MX1 race one:

1, Steven Frossard, France, Yamaha, 30’07.205

2, Tony Cairoli, Italy, KTM 30’15.614

3, Evgeny Bobryshev, Russia, Honda, 30’24.718

4, Davide Guarneri, Italy, Kawasaki, 30’26.718

5, Tanel Leok, Estonia, TM, 30’48.974

MX1 race two:

1, Evgeny Bobryshev, Russia, Honda, 29’50.530

2, Max Nagl, Germany, KTM, 29’53.367

3, Tony Cairoli, Italy, KTM, 29’55.104

4, David Philippaerts, Italy, Yamaha, 29’55.829 5.299

5, Kevin Strijbos, Belgium, Suzuki

MX1 overall after two rounds:

1, Evgeny Bobryshev, Russia, Honda, 80 points – 120 – 200

2, Tony Cairoli, Italy, KTM , 100 – 80 – 180

3, Steven Frossard, France, Yamaha 120 – 50 – 170

4, Davide Guarneri, Italy, Kawasaki 65 – 55 – 120

5, David Philippaerts, Italy, Yamaha, 50 – 65 – 115

6, Kevin Strijbos, Belgium, Suzuki 45 – 60 – 105

7, Max Nagl, Germany, KTM, 0 – 100 -100

MX2 championship overall, after two rounds:

1, Gautier Paulin, France, Yamaha 112

2, Alessio Chiodi, Italy, Suzuki 104

3, Jeffrey Herlings, Netherlands, KTM 81

4, Peter Smitka, Czech, TM 77

5, Steven Lenoir, France, Yamaha 71

Here is video footage from round one of the series: