Gautier Paulin and AXO took the honors this weekend in Loket and won their second Grand Prix of the season in Czech Republic.

The Grand Prix of Czech Republic at the circuit of Loket is a regular fixture on the Motocross World Championship calendar for many years now.

After his disappointing performance in Lommel last week, Gautier Paulin was highly motivated and trained hard before flying to Czech Republic. Saturday was pretty tough with a crash during a practice session and later a collision during the qualifying race; only sixteenth on the gate Gautier knew that a good start was still possible courtesy of the long straight and twice he got away in the top ten. Ninth at the beginning of race one, Gautier found several tight spots to pass his rivals and came back to fourth. He grabbed the holeshot in the second race and then delivered a strong ride to collect his first moto win since Turkey and the second GP success of his career after Italy four months ago.

Gautier Paulin: “It was important to react this weekend, to prove that the team and I are better than what we got in Lommel, where we had a couple of problems. On Monday morning I was training and the technical staff was working on the bikes to prepare this GP. Everyone in the team trusts me, mentally I always believe that I have a chance to get the title and when I got the holeshot in the second heat I knew that a win was possible. I didn’t take too many risks as the track was slippery. This win is great for the team because everyone works so hard. Now my goal is to reach good results in Lierop, I want to show that I can ride fast also on a sandy circuit!”.

Unlucky week end for Suzuki factory riders Ken De Dycker and Steve Ramon: the first struggled with stomach ache and had problems with his goggles in Race 1, while the second was forced to retire in the first heat due to a technical problem and was 6^th in the last race.

In MX2 Nicolas Aubin produced a strong performance in Race 1, but was forced to the pits when his Yamaha had a technical problem. The strong Frenchman still managed to conquer a good fifth spot in Race 2.

Coming next: the Grand Prix of the Netherlands, to be held at Lierop at the end of August.