Jordi Tixier - No more Mr Nice Guy!
By Alex Hodgkinson on 7th Jan 15
At the end of July, Jordi Tixier was looking for a new ride after getting the sack from KTM. By mid-September the stylish Frenchman clinched the seventh consecutive MX2 world title for Mattighofen in his last ride in orange and was getting ready to bolt the No.1 plate on green.
"I knew when I arrived in Mexico that many people would say that Jeffrey would have been champion if he hadn't got hurt but injury is part of our sport,” he said. "It can happen to me, it can happen to any rider – and it did happen to Jeffrey.
"Yeah, Jeffrey would have been champion if he didn't get hurt but he did and it was my time to get the world title.
"I don't care what the people say. I am world champion, my dream has come true and nobody can ever take it away from me.
"Even when Jeffrey got hurt there was still a long way to go to get the title. I had to finish on the podium or close in all the remaining races and I did it.”
Jordi is refreshingly up front when analysing his own performances.
"I think I improved a lot through the year,” he said. "I learnt a lot from my mistakes in the past years and I had a bad start to this year too but I came back and got many podiums and my first two GP wins in Loket and Mexico.
"I think I rode a really good second moto after I crashed on the first lap but came back from 14th to win the GP and the world title.
"I have to admit that when Jeffrey was injured in 2013 I had too much pressure on my shoulders – I crashed and I made mistakes and I didn't win a single race while he was out.
"I always really hated Loket in the years before. It is so slippery and normally I never ride very well there but when I arrived this year I said ‘I don't care, I am just going to give everything I can and do it'.
FOR FULL ARTICLE, SEE TMX JANUARY 8 (ISSUE1953)
