{"id":43477,"date":"2025-08-04T19:00:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T19:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/43477\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T19:00:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T19:00:08","slug":"febvre-and-coenen-battle-again-at-mxgp-of-flanders-de-wolf-fights-back-in-mx2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/43477\/","title":{"rendered":"Febvre and Coenen Battle Again at MXGP of Flanders, de Wolf Fights Back in MX2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Just as he did in Saturday\u2019s\u00a0Qualifying Race, Isak Gifting<\/a>\u00a0shot out of the gate rapidly on his special Anniversary-liveried\u00a0JK Racing Yamaha,\u00a0but he was just out-dragged to the\u00a0Fox Holeshot Award\u00a0line by Febvre after the Frenchman pulled a perfect first corner pass. Herlings was right there in third, ahead of the\u00a0JM Racing Honda\u00a0of\u00a0Brent Van Doninck<\/a>\u00a0and home hero\u00a0Jago Geerts<\/a>, the best-starting\u00a0Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP\u00a0rider.\u00a0 There was bad luck for Bonacorsi, however, as he was on the ground in the first corner and having to fight from the back, just behind Bogers and\u00a0Honda HRC\u00a0man\u00a0Ruben Fernandez<\/a>\u00a0who had been pushed off-track!<\/p>\n

Coenen fought past Van Doninck and Geerts in the first few corners to get into fourth, and Herlings was quickly past Gifting to chase after Febvre. At the end of the first full lap, Coenen flew high and long from the Pit Lane wall jump to pass Gifting for third, a move he would make use of many times through the day!<\/p>\n

The home favourite did the same thing the very next lap on Herlings, whose was clearly not going to send it off that jump with his recently-healed collarbone, and the stage was set for the two title contenders to fight it out at the top.<\/p>\n

Battle was joined behind them between Yamaha men Gifting and Vlaanderen, but they both moved up a position on lap seven as Herlings fell in the wooded section, dropping the Dutchman to eighth behind countryman\u00a0Glenn Coldenhoff<\/a>\u00a0on the\u00a0Fantic Factory Racing MXGP\u00a0machine.\u00a0 Geerts was pursuing Van Doninck for fifth, but he suffered a massive get-off over the triple jump after the Finish Line, being hit by the bike and, although he walked away, he was out of action for the rest of the day.\u00a0 We all wish him the best in his recovery.<\/p>\n

While Coenen was stalking Febvre, Norwegian\u00a0Hakon Fredriksen<\/a>,\u00a0on his private\u00a0YRC Performance Yamaha,\u00a0was working his way into the top ten, not far ahead of a recovering Bonacorsi, who had passed Herlings for ninth on lap ten.\u00a0Maxime Renaux<\/a>,\u00a0still on the path back from injury, took tenth in the race for\u00a0Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP,\u00a0as Herlings mischievously pinched eighth back from Bonacorsi on the last lap. Fredriksen got past Van Doninck for an amazing sixth place, only two seconds back from Coldenhoff who took fifth.<\/p>\n

Up ahead though, all Belgian eyes were on Coenen as he marched up to Febvre\u2019s back wheel, and used his signature wall jump move to fly into the lead at the end of lap 12!\u00a0 The experience of Febvre paid benefits, however, as he knew that he had to strike back instantly on his young rival, and carved to the inside of the KTM after just four corners with enough authority to force the Belgian off the track!<\/p>\n

On the same lap, Vlaanderen was able to dance past Gifting for third, and that\u2019s where the Yamaha men would finish.\u00a0 Coenen made one last charge to get back onto terms with Febvre, but had a massive moment on the exit of the \u201cLommelwood\u201d section that forced him to throw in the towel.\u00a0 Febvre was able to cruise over the line and enjoy his 55th career GP race victory, and extend the Championship lead to 12 points.<\/p>\n

Coenen promised MXGP-TV Presenter Lisa Leyland\u00a0a good show before race two, and we certainly got one!\u00a0 There was a rare sight at the start, as Jeffrey Herlings<\/a> claimed his first\u00a0Fox Holeshot Award\u00a0since October 2021 in France with a sweeping move around Gifting, who again held second, until Febvre cut to the inside of him at the third corner. Simultaneously, Vlaanderen grabbed fifth from Coenen and the race seemed to be going the way of the Kawasaki man once more.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Just as he did in Saturday\u2019s\u00a0Qualifying Race, Isak Gifting\u00a0shot out of the gate rapidly on his special Anniversary-liveried\u00a0JK…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":43478,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[38069,64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-43477","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-2025-mxgp-racer-x-motocross-magazine-supercross-dirt-bike-mx-racerx-illustrated-dirtbike-motorcycle-racing-freestyle-video-news","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-motor","12":"tag-motor-sports","13":"tag-motosport","14":"tag-motosports","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43478"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43477"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}