Husqvarna Factory rider Jed Beaton finished ninth overall in MX2 at the FIM Motocross World Championship MXGP of Latvia.
It marked the first race back for the world championship after a long five-month pause due to the COVID-19 pandemic and riders were eager to get racing. Beaton endured a frustrating opening race. The Tasmanian’s great start and strong early position of sixth was quickly unravelled just a few corners into the 30-minute-plus-two-lap moto when a small tip-over demoted him to 31st place. A race-long charge saw Beaton carve his way through the field to record a 15th place finish.
Following his challenging first race in Latvia, Beaton was looking for redemption in moto two. After battling with Maxime Renaux during the early stages of the race, Beaton made the pass into sixth place at the halfway point of the race and inched away as the laps wound down. With a sizable gap ahead of him to reach fifth position, the 22-year-old maintained his position to the finish and currently sits in third place in the MX2 World Championship.
“Qualifying went really well and I’m happy with my speed. I had a good start in race one and caught the edge of a rut entering a corner early on and fell,” said Beaton. “I was then dead last and coming through the pack pretty well, I got up to 18th and then someone just ran me off the track. So, the work I did was for nothing and then I had to start over. I used up a little too much energy in that one, basically battling the whole race. In the second moto, I didn’t get the best of starts and ran eighth for a little while. I then pushed hard to get up to sixth but by then fifth was just too far ahead to close in on. I’m looking forward to Wednesday, it’ll be a new race and I’m going in with an open mind so hopefully I can stay out of trouble and get some decent results.”
MX2 Championship Standings
1. Tom Vialle (KTM) 134pts;
2. Jago Geerts (Yamaha) 112;
3. Jed Beaton (Husqvarna) 95