Andrea Adamo – Hunting the Red Plate

There is no question, the MX2 class despite the riders being very young and inexperienced, has amazing talent and that talent makes for a very exciting 2023 MX2 World Championship , even more so now that series favourite and points leader Jago Geerts from Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2 Team will miss the next two rounds with injury.

Just one point off the red plate after the MXGP of France is Italian rider Red Bull KTM Factory Racing’s Andrea Adamo. Adamo, who won his first Grand Prix at Trentino, Italy  has shown signs that his future will be a bright one and his mentor under the orange tent of KTM, Joel Smets was very excited for the youngster on that special day in Italy.

“I was emotional when he was on the podium (in Trentino) because nobody expected him to do that,” Smets said. “Nobody had their money on him. If I was not emotional, I would not be here anymore, if it didn’t touch me, I wouldn’t be here anymore. If I was not sad after a loss, then I stay home. You know, when I quit racing, it took me a while to get those emotions back for the sport and I did take a step back after retiring to get away from this and just to find myself and see what I wanted to do. Andrea is my rider; my boy and he showed a lot in Trentino, and it was good to see.”

In France last week, Adamo again made the podium with 3-3 results, as he started to close down the series points lead still owned by  Geerts and while Adamo doesn’t want anyone to get injured and hopes for Geerts to be back soon, he still wanted to give it 100% and fight for as many points as possible.

“I managed two good races today but not with good starts! I came back well and had a nice battle with Liam (Everts). I made a lot of passes and took some risks in the second race. I was too far back and had to fix the situation. Lap after lap I was coming back to Liam and that gave me the energy to keep going and reach P3 again. Second position overall represents a good weekend. Unfortunately, Jago [Geerts] was not riding with us but that is also part of the sport and means we are just one point from the lead. Let’s see what we can do in Latvia.”

Now onto Latvia a sand circuit that might not totally suit the Italian hard pack specialist, but with Smets, a former sand master and the continued building of experience, nobody would be surprised to see Adamo do well in Latvia and the possibility of him taking the red plate in the next round of the series is very strong. Just one point behind Geerts and 11 ahead of third placed man Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing’s Kay de Wolf, it will just take some solid results for Adamo to enter the German Grand Prix (the next round after Latvia) with his KTM machine carrying a red plate.

Photo Credit: Ray Archer