about to unfold! The first race was pretty straightforward for Geerts, who passed Thibault Benistant on the opening lap to take over the lead; the ‘198’ collected his first Fox holeshot of the season in fine style, but no sooner had he been pushed back to 2nd, a mistake on lap two allowed Vialle an easy route through to 2nd position. Vialle was in impressive form, moving from 10th to 2nd in the space of two laps, and set his sights on Geerts for the lead. Despite getting close, Geerts held on for his eighth win of the year, adding a further three points to his slender championship lead. Benistant came home in 3rd, ahead of Mikkel Haarup, Kevin Horgmo and Simon Laengenfelder; the German riding solo in MX2 as Mattia Guadagnini had been moved to MXGP for the rest of the season. With temperatures reaching 30˚, the Riola circuit was a real physical and mental test for the riders, and with a short break between races, some riders struggled to fully recover, but there were no such problems for the two fastest MX2 riders in the world. Benistant claimed his second Fox holeshot of the day but by turn five, Vialle had showed him an elbow to take over the lead. This time it was Geerts who gated poorly, but after a busy first lap, had moved from 8th to 3rd, passing Benistant for 2nd on lap two. From there, Vialle and Geerts were evenly matched, their pace relentless as they left everyone else in their wake. It’s almost like they were transfixed on each other, zoning out to ignore everything else around them. Impressive stuff. Vialle got his revenge from race one to take his fourth GP win of the season, with both riders finishing on equal points to keep the gap at the top to just 6 points. Benistant was on the podium (33), his first of the season with 3rd overall. Horgmo and Adamo rounded out the top five. Vlaanderen Makes History in Sardinia Under bright blue skies and with temperatures nudging 30˚ the MXGP of Sardinia was always going to be a real test of man and machine, with a whole lot of endurance thrown in for good measure. Circuit conditions were brutal, the deep sand energy-sapping, giving the riders no room to let-up. And this was only
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