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Anderson was 450 supercross champ on husq.
Doesn't change the fact that he was at his best by far in 2022 on the KX, unfortunately he had to go up against the best version of Tomac that year..
In my defense, I had a few brews for the first time in a while last night lol. I’m still standing on Kawi being a turd, but I do wish Kawi made it work with Tom, because I’d rather tom be here on a turd rather than back overseas
They had great success with that chassis, Osborn Anderson and Webb all brought them gold. That hasn't been the case for 3 years now. One could argue the 250 has done better under the new chassis, but the 450 had not been a success story. Especially when you consider the tweaks they've done since it was released.
Anderson won on a successful bike when Webb was on that turd of a McCarthy Yamaha, and Eli and Musquin both missed rounds. He then had lackluster results until switching to Kawasaki where he won races and competed for championships. Since then, Kawasaki is on a new platform as well, and Jason has finished as high as 2nd in an era of the Lawrence brothers, a feisty Tomac, Sexton and Webb.
Clear indications the Austrian bikes are struggling. The only indication of problems with Kawasaki is from Prado. I won't read much into Roman's championship because regardless of anything said to the press, we don't know how close it is to production. He did win on a Kawasaki, but it was in a works bike in a depleted field.
Anderson's only close title run against a deep field was on Kawasaki.
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What is absolutely clear is:
He was never comfortable on the Kawi. Whatever was in the teams power and ability to make him feel comfortable was not enough or possibly in their will to make changes. Coming 2 years (of the contract) would most likely be lost time.
I agree his ”quitting” and interviews was not good but he really needed to get off that team.
Surely he tried in qualifying and made some great starts but white knuckles full motos - forget that.
I think it is similar to the (F1) situation with Hamilton in the 2025 Ferrari, 7-time world champ (with most race wins and poles) who can barely drive the car. Team mate Leclerc actually does better in the car but that doesent mean the car is good…
No. It was the crown on his head when he had just beaten MC for the title.
This was 2001. RC wasn't the goat then and there was a real feeling that MC was going to come back in 2002 and win.
I think Kawasaki won the World and Canadian championships on that bike.
Just wait until every Saturday in 2026 when RC, Diffey, and Weege (sorry Weege, yes you too) talk about Prado and Kawi separating…it’s never going to end
What! lol
I watch Tommy race an old 70's 250 Elsinore in the Vet A class in the early 2000's against guys on new 450's. He won the race from the back of the pack with a good lead.
He bought the bike on Thursday and brought to a private track on Friday. I used to ride at. It ran like crap and had a blown fork seal, it was not in good condition. He worked on it and raced it on Sunday. Guy was in fantastic shape and could still haul ass on any bike he rode! He still had the dog in him!
Febvre won when Prado wasn`t there + Herlings and Gajser didn`t race all the GPs due to injuries.
Phil was a 11th place guy in AMA last year, so Prado could probably won the Canadian championship easily as well.
I will go ahead and take what Chad said about the situation including what he said about the team and feel comfortable with my opinion on the situation.
Sorry, I thought Kawasaki won those championships this year, thanks for the correction.
From what Tickle, and the mechanics have said, plus Kawasaki bringing over people from Japan to solve the issues, it seems that Kawi worked hard to get the bike to work for Prado.
I believe Tickle said that they knew how to get him what he wanted, but that it was very difficult. I took that to mean that they would have to radically change the engine to do it.
I'm thinking this whole dilemma is simply that Prado wanted a lot of power in the bottom end, and that the Kx was stronger in mid-top.
Kawi couldn't get that amount of power to the bottom end without redesigning the engine, and Prado wasn't able, or maybe wasn't interested in changing his riding style to become more of a revver. That's a pretty big gap between bike and rider.
My problem is how it was handled.
He needs to talk about it, without putting the blame on Kawi. Sometimes a bike and rider don't gel. If he wants this to not affect his career, he should follow my advice from my earlier post.
This could have all been avoided if Kawasaki let him back off a few NM from the engine hangers to get more chassis compliance.
I seem to recall, from Lewis’s interview Prado late in the season, that they pretty much solved the power (delivery) issue, but that they still needed handling improvements to take advantage of that. Whatever it turns out to be, it’s water under the bridge now.
Best wishes to all teams and riders for 2026. It’s going to be a spectacular season!
Love that story!👍🏻😎
Pit Row
That’s wild. Was it a smoothed out vintage track, or was Tommy clearing doubles with 4 inches of ‘70s suspension?
Was the regular MX track!
Edit. That track had a lot of table tops. I don't remember if there were any doubles, at the time of that race.
The "Benoklin Blast". Guy was fun to watch.
Here is what happened...Prado got smoked by Jett, Hunter, Eli, Chase, RJ, and others...it broke him mentally, so he had to blame it on the bike. He felt there was no other option for him. I get it.
2026 he will only have himself to blame, though...he will try harder. It will be interesting. The Kawi was not the problem.
How are we still talking about this? There's almost more pages to this thread than Prado has U MX motos completed.
If he announced he was leaving and that he was giving kawi 2 weeks, I would almost understand the not really giving it his all (although he should probably atleast try and appear like he is trying). Unfortunately, this isn't a great example. It was waaaaayyyyy longer than 2 weeks he drug his ass around the track, and this is a contract, between 2 businesses with reputation at stake.
I kind of get it if you are a drive thru attendant at mcdonalds, but I would bet if you asked that question to the top 40 CEO's in the world, you would get a much different answer as they are judged on professionalism, just like Jorge.
Basically, Prado ripped off Kawi. He failed to uphold his end of the deal.
I"m excited to see what he can do on the KTM , now he has to prove himself or bust.
The differences between Kawasaki Factory Europe and Factory Kawasaki US are perplexing, why allow a reconstruction of the bike in Europe to win and then be so restrictive on the US side? It really doesn’t make any sense, I understand it’s the truth being as it has been verified by multiple riders who have gone through their team here in the US, but what is the reasoning? I would think winning is the goal, no matter how close that machine is to what the consumer can buy.
A different perspective on Prado's story.
It was the heat and humidity that underperformed him. He also performed poorly in Europe when it was really hot.
I think adapting to American weather conditions was the biggest factor.
If no one wants to acknowledge that, not Prado and not Kawa, then you get lost egos in the wilderness of reproach. In short, a lot of drama.
Just different rules. US is limited due to production based rules. MXGP is true factory works bike without those limitations.
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