UK Team Talk
By Ben Rumbold on 15th Mar 23
Tommy Searle quite fancies lifting a couple more titles this year (Photo: Elliot Spencer)
Tommy Searle returns to the brand that he has ridden for the most in his career with the newly christened GTCI Revo Kawasaki team. Run by the same company that sponsors the ACU British Championship series, they are very keen to keep the crown in Searle’s name. However, Tommy’s former employer Dave Thorpe has brought in two major weapons to try and keep the trophy in the Crendon Fastrack Honda cabinet.
Current and three-time MX2 Champion Conrad Mewse switches to Japanese machinery for the first time in his career. Teamed with the returning Josh Gilbert, who was with Husqvarna last year, it is a powerhouse effort and all with West Country accents. If anyone poses a major threat to King Thomas’ reign it’s these guys.
The prologue to this battle, the new British Championship Arenacross series, did go the way of the consistently fast-starting Searle with three wins but Mewse and Gilbert took the team title and all the other wins between them. Conrad was blindingly fast in victory at the Wembley finale and already the needle has begun with a collision between him and Tommy in Aberdeen. This one could go on all year and should be brilliant!
The Crendon Fastrack Honda pairing of Josh Gilbert and Conrad Mewse are gelling well.
Elsewhere, perennial challenger Shaun Simpson has merged his team with another to create the Gabriel SS24 KTM squad, featuring himself and multiple South African Champion Tristan Purdon. Purdon impressed at a couple of rounds last year and could be a real dark horse for the crown.
Speaking of horses and Scots, ASA United GASGAS has signed its own Italian stallion, former GP wildman Ivo Monticelli, to race alongside their second-year MX1 charger John Adamson who is perhaps equally as wild.
Not to be forgotten, CAB Screens Crescent Yamaha will once more field Estonian stylist Harri Kullas – a three-time MX Nationals Champion but runner-up to Searle in each of the last two Revo seasons. The new Yamaha is reported to be a big step forward worldwide and once they get the hang of the new bikes this team will be a force. Harri is joined by MX1 rookie Jamie Carpenter, who matched his new teammate’s 2022 CV by winning the Michelin Nationals and finishing second in the Revo series! Winning at both Foxhill and Landrake, Carpenter has a superb work ethic and is a model of consistency - the team love him straight away!
SC Sporthomes Husqvarna is still uncertain if Evgeny Bobryshev will be allowed to race in 2023 despite him getting a new passport to replace his Russian one! They have signed Finnish star Miro Sihvonen for MX1 and he could certainly make his presence felt.
Chambers Racing are using GASGAS machinery this year and have signed Dan Thornhill to run alongside Tom Grimshaw, who moves up from MX2.
KTM riders Liam Knight and Ashton Dickinson, as well as Apico Husqvarna veteran Martin Barr, will also be keen to get amongst ‘em!
The MX2 class sees an exodus of the entire top-five from last year. Mewse, Carpenter and Grimshaw have all moved up, Jamie Law has retired and Isak Gifting has departed. Sadly, in the case of the Swede, it is due to the withdrawal, for this season anyway, of Roger Magee’s Hitachi KTM team. Their other rider Kay Karssemakers has signed for a Dutch Husqvarna team so won’t be in the UK.
This leaves the GTCI Revo Kawasaki team star Dylan Walsh as the highest-ranked rider left and if he were to do the whole series he would certainly be a favourite. The 2019 MX2 British Champion is determined to pursue his American dream and currently runs in the top 10 of the 250 West Supercross series. There are a couple of date clashes as well as the need to traverse the Atlantic several times back and forth in order to do both. Again, Revo are the title sponsor so they want both titles! Watch this space for the fate of one of the most dynamic racers in the class.
The Hawkstone International showed that a bunch of other MX2 flyers will battle this one out in 2023. Second-year Chambers boy Alfie Jones looked good in the sand as did CAB Screens Crescent Yamaha man Sam Nunn. ASA United GASGAS run Bobby Bruce once more, and if he stays healthy could be a threat. Jamie Wainwright is back with his own family team on a KTM and could be a challenger.
Plus there are a whole host of exciting rookies led by Charlie Heyman, the runaway 2022 125cc Youth Champion, his 250cc counterpart Tyler Westcott, Ollie Colmer, Billy Askew, and Ben Mustoe. Colmer was a big surprise at Hawkstone battling with another contender, Gabriel SS24 KTM’s Taylor Hammal.
Not so many big names, true, but they will all be out to make their own names the next big ones!
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