Kawasaki Racing Team

The Kawasaki Racing Team enters 2010 with renewed vigour and optimism, determined as ever to put the disappointment of an injury-plagued 2009 behind them. And, with the three-pronged spearhead of Sébastien Pourcel, Jonathan Barragan and Xavier Boog, the green MX1 factory team has every right to be confident.

Each of the three riders has been preparing decisively for a new, exciting challenge as KRT enters its second season under new management in the wake of team founder Jan de Groot’s tragic and sudden death in the summer of 2007. The legendary Dutchman’s widow Ellen continued to front the team for 18 months before passing over control to the equally resilient duo of Roger Pourcel and Thierry Chizat Suzzoni, two Frenchmen with an impressive background in the sport of motocross and business.

By the middle of last summer team leader Sébastien Pourcel and women’s world championship leader Livia Lancelot were both on the sidelines, leaving Gareth Swanepoel as the team’s sole representative, the South African eventually completing his rookie MX1 season in a highly respectable 8th position.

With time to carefully consider the future, Kawasaki Motors Europe made the conscious decision to ask KRT to concentrate all of their efforts in an even more decisive assault on the MX1 world title in future; in the wake of the 2009 experience in a sport where the potential for injury is never far away, the team has been expanded to three riders with the addition of a second title contender in the shape of Spaniard Jonathan Barragan, and, with an eye to the future, a truly top flight rookie in Frenchman Xavier Boog.

All three riders face a differing but specific challenge this year.

Pourcel must put behind him the frustration of injury for the second time in his career to return to the very forefront of the world stage, a ranking he held prior to his injuries at the end of 2008 after his individual victory at the world’s largest race, the Motocross of Nations.

Barragan, a multiple GP winner in recent years, switches to Kawasaki for the first time in his career, but arrives on the KRT team in the secure knowledge that the green bikes are remarkably easy machines to adapt to, even for such a forceful rider as the Spaniard.

Boog, on the other hand, must master the surplus of power which comes with a 450 after a career to date spent on machinery of little more than half that capacity; but the stocky Frenchman reinforced KRT management’s belief in him at the end of last year by registering his maiden GP success in an MX3 GP wild card ride aboard a 450.

The expectations for 2010 are clearly defined. Both Pourcel and Barragan are proven GP winners and top three candidates with a genuine shot at the MX1 world title itself, while Boog clearly has the qualifications to join his teammates in the world top ten in his rookie year. The future looks bright for the Kawasaki Racing Team.

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Riders

Sébastien Pourcel

Riding Number: 90
Class: MX1
Date of birth: 11 February 1985
Hometown: Chateauneuf les Martigues, France
Nationality: French

rider profile
Sébastien Pourcel

Jonathan Barragan

Riding Number: 7
Class: MX1
Date of birth: 19 September 1985
Hometown: Madrid, Spain
Nationality: Spanish

rider profile
Jonathan Barragan

Xavier Boog

Riding Number: 121
Class: MX1
Date of birth: 4 March 1988
Hometown: Meyenheim, France
Nationality: French

rider profile
Xavier Boog

Manager/Staff

Thierry Chizat Suzzoni

Function: Team Owner
Date of Birth: 17 July 1963
Nationality: French

Roger Pourcel

Function: Team Owner
Date of Birth: 9 October 1961
Nationality: French

François Lemariey

Function: Team Manager
Date of Birth: 8 July 1984
Nationality: French

Jorg Pyka

Function: Mechanic to Barragan
Date of Birth: 21 September 1976
Nationality: German

Rene Ebert

Function: Engine mechanic
Date of Birth: 7 June 1975
Nationality: German

Dominique Alleaume

Function: Mechanic for training bikes
Date of Birth: 25 November 1964
Nationality: French

Luc Bruggeman

Function: Mechanic to Sébastien Pourcel
Date of Birth: 24 November 1958
Nationality: Belgian

Harrie van Hout

Function: Mechanic to Xavier Boog
Date of Birth: 9 September 1981
Nationality: Dutch

Maurice v.d. Broek

Function: Mechanic for training bikes
Date of Birth: 30 January 1992
Nationality: Dutch

Grant Covus

Function: Suspension engineer – Technical Touch
Date of Birth: 11 October 1961
Nationality: Australian

Motocross Teams & Riders

2010 MXGP Team Presentation

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