2019 FIM SIDECAR MOTOCROSS WORLD CHAMPION
BAX BACK ON TOP
Etienne Bax became a three-time FIM Sidecar Motocross World Champion in 2019, adding to his 2015 and 2017 titles with a season of unerring consistency that wielded fourteen victories, including five doubles. After finishing third overall last season when he reunited with Latvia’s Kaspars Stupelis, the Dutchman retained his passenger for this campaign hoping they could rekindle the magic that saw them last lift the championship together four years previously, before Bax teamed up with his brother Robbie and then won a title with France’s Nicolas Musset.
The pair came under pressure throughout the season from defending champions Marvin Vanluchene of Belgium and his Dutch passenger Ben Van Den Bogaart, who were strong again, but simply not fast enough this time around and will focus their efforts on a renewed challenge together in 2020.
Bax’s third FIM Sidecar Motocross World Championship title is the latest achievement of a career that began in the Dutch amateur championship, which he won in 2004. The thirty-one-year-old has also celebrated five prestigious national titles in the Netherlands, three of them with Stupelis, alongside his international success.
PALMARES
3 x FIM Sidecar Motocross World Champion (Driver) – 2019, 2017, 2015
STUPELIS SEALS FOURTH TITLE
Kaspars Stupelis became a four-time FIM Sidecar Motocross World Champion in 2019, adding to his 2003, 2004 and 2015 titles with a season of unerring consistency alongside Dutch driver Etienne Bax. After finishing third overall in 2018 when he reunited with Bax after a two-year parting, this season the pair were able to rekindle the magic that saw them lift the championship together four years previously, claiming fourteen victories, including five doubles.
The pair came under pressure throughout the season from defending champions Marvin Vanluchene of Belgium and his Dutch passenger Ben Van Den Bogaart, who were strong again, but simply not fast enough this time around and will focus their efforts on a renewed challenge together in 2020. Last year’s runners-up Koen Hermans of the Netherlands and France’s Nicolas Musset manage third overall, despite their constant mechanical woes.
Stupelis’ first two titles came alongside Daniël Willemsen, who proved an astute judge when he picked the relatively unknown passenger in 2003 and took thirty victories over the next two seasons, winning the championship twice. The pair have not raced together in the FIM Sidecar Motocross World Championship since, however will reunite in 2020 as the Dutch legend aims for his eleventh title with the Latvian now targeting a fifth.
PALMARES
4 x FIM Sidecar Motocross World Champion (Passenger) – 2019, 2015, 2004, 2003
