World champ Tim Gajser has confirmed he WILL be fit to race in the SMX Cup in Germany next weekend, and the Monster Cup in Las Vegas. And he’ll race the new 2017 factory Honda at both events. Gajser crashed while training for the Motocross of Nations, picking up severe bruising which kept him out of the event.

Gajser said: “We were speaking in Glen Helen about testing the new bike before Maggiora, and with Honda and HRC we worked together to make the test happen in Slovenia on my track. I really like the new bike and the test was going well and we’d decided that I was going to race it at the MX of Nations. But then in the whoops I made a little mistake and got sideways and crashed. Actually the crash wasn’t so big, but I hit the ground really hard with the whole right side of my body. I had a lot of bad bruising and some damage to the muscles in my shoulder and my hip. Because of that, we received medical advice that we couldn’t go to Maggiora in order to try and be ready instead to come back for SMX and Monster Cup because they were the main goals.

“It was a tough decision to have to miss the Nations, but in the end I think we made the right choice because in the week since the crash already I’ve had some rest and my body is starting to recover. This week I’ve started cycling again and working back towards fitness for SMX. Because a lot of the injury was muscular I think I will still feel some pain there next weekend, but I’m sure it will be ok. So I’m very happy to confirm that I will compete at the Monster Energy SMX Riders’ Cup and at the Monster Cup, and I will ride the 2017 Honda CRF at both events too, so I’m very excited to get behind the gate again.”