There was no doubt about it, when Ken Roczen and Jeffrey Herlings came into the professional ranks around 10 years ago, they were going to dominate the sport, and it didn’t matter where they raced, be it in America or Europe, these two 15 year olds were on the way to becoming the two best European racers ever.
Until now, both Roczen and Herlings have had massive success. The German a World MX2 champion ship and two AMA 450 motocross championships. The Dutchman, three World MX2 championships and a World MXGP championship.
Roczen’s achievements in America rank him as one of the best non-America races to run the AMA championships, right up there with names like Chad Reed (two SX and one MX title), Grant Langston (two MX titles) and J. M. Bayle (two MX titles and one SX title), a list of riders very much among the all-time greats.
How can we forget the way Herlings dominated the best American based riders at Ironman in 2017, winning both races and one of those from the very back of the pack after an early fall. No GP rider had done this since maybe DeCoster in the 1970s.
Both have MXoN team victories to their name, and both are still capable of winning another two or three championships each, but damn, the sport is cruel.
Roczen’s body has been so damaged from that one big crash in January of 2017, when he dislocated his wrist, dislocated his elbow and also compounded his radius and underwent 11 surgeries between January and July of 2017 to repair compound fractures to his radius and ulna, scaphoid fractures, torn ligaments and a dislocated elbow. Since he can’t seem to put together a full season without having some issues and his results are very up and down. He went from dominating the Outdoors to hardly winning a race, let alone an overall.
This whole coronavirus 2020 hasn’t helped and no doubt his body is open to picking up any virus going around. His aim to be AMA supercross champion is still something he is capable of, but when he decided to take off the summer and rest for the 2021 AMA supercross season, you had the feeling this is the start of the end for the rider who arrived on the scene in Europe and made everyone (but Herlings) look average.
His two AMA motocross championships were perfection and it seemed he would dominate in America for years to come, yet now four years after his second outdoor title, he hasn’t added to his tally. Hardly a main event win in supercross and totally dominated by Eli Tomac in motocross.
Yes, motocross is a cruel sport, a sport that spits out the most talented riders and ends careers quickly. While Herlings has proven to be unbeatable when fit, his injuries will probably be the thing many people remember in 20 years, despite his staggering GP win ratio and his four World titles.
On many occasions “The Bullet” has been the man, losing titles through injury when he was clearly the best rider. It happened when he lost to Jordi Tixier in 2014, Tim Gajser in 2015, Antonio Cairoli in 2017 and now again while leading the World and heading for a seemingly easy fifth World title, it happened again. That is four World title he really should have won, but of course, should have, could have, would have means nothing when the points are added up at the end of the season.
When Herlings injured his ankle in 2019 he thought about retirement, having worked hard to come back, and then win a race (with the ankle broken) in Latvia, another six months on the couch seemed like a bad idea. He had already damaged his ankle so badly that still to this day he has less mobility and suffers from pain in the ankle.
The talk of retirement is something many have expected, having been through so many injuries and financially more than stable, it seemed pointless to risk more damage to his health, but for somebody as competitive as Herlings, the idea of no racing, not doing what he loves just didn’t sit well.
There was that 101 GP victories to chase, another World title or two and pass the greats like Roger De Coster, Joel Robert, Eric Geboers, Georges Jobe and Joel Smets. The risk was worth it, and despite his injury riddled career, it was just in ankle that gave him trouble.
This last crash was a bad one, maybe the worse as far as what could have happened. Having sat and watched the footage of his crash and then the aftermath, I felt this might finally be the end, my gut feeling was he will retire. Watching the Dutchman laying on the ground, not being able to move his lower body and then seeing him on the stretcher, seemingly screaming from under his helmet was something I can’t watch again, once was more than enough.
As reports came in that he had lost feeling in his limbs is frightening and I know, if it was me, I would tuck my helmet away and start spending some of those dollars he has earnt through blood, pain and hard work. But I am not Jeffrey Herlings, my work ethic is somewhat lazy, and my attitude to pain is of a little boy who often got picked up by his mum after falling, getting a kiss on the minor damage and getting a big cuddle, yes, I can handle pain about as much as ice can handle a hot day.
If Herlings retired today, he retires with four World titles, 90 GP wins and a Motocross of Nations victory. A legend, and one of the most successful riders in the sports history. He could look back in 20 years and smile about his achievements and be more than satisfied as he maybe drops his kids to school, heads back home to his large house in Holland and enjoys the spoils of his success with his partner. But we all know though, Jeffrey Herlings isn’t easily satisfied and deep inside, he will remember those lost opportunities, those seasons when he was clearly the fastest man in the World, and still came home with zero, just pain and discomfort from his injuries. He might regret not getting those extra 11 GP wins to become the winningest GP rider of all time.
For me, I hope if he does come back, I hope he can remain fit, healthy and get another title or two, win another dozen or so GP wins a couple more MXoN team victories, and then retire satisfied, knowing the sport was also kind to him, and gave him as much as it took.
Now, as we sit in this very strange 2020 season, and those two 15 years olds are both 25 years old, both with a nice list of championships to their names, and plenty of dollars to spend in the future, they also both sit on the couch, either mentally done for 2020 or recovering from injuries, we can just think back to 2009 and 2010 for the moment, when they arrived and quickly won GPs and World titles and gave us something to look forward to in the future.
A decade is a short career, but for these two brilliant young men, injuries and bad luck have really cruelled their expectations, or maybe more so, our expectations. If I could make a wish in this mental season of Covid19, I would wish both these guys could come back in 2021, race injury free and win titles, main events, GPs or whatever comes their way, because they both deserve that.
Ray Archer image
Monday, September 21, 2020 at 3:40PM 
