Image: Octopi Media.

Reflecting on his first-ever season in the 2023 Pro Motocross Championship, two-time world champion Tom Vialle admits that he transitioned into 250MX with a lack of base outdoors ahead of the Fox Raceway opener.

After securing his second MX2 World Championship last year, Vialle ventured to the US with Red Bull KTM Factory Racing in what marked his AMA debut.

While he was able to score a moto and round win at Southwick and another overall podium at Ironman, Vialle revealed he found the short turnaround from the Monster Energy Supercross season – his maiden 250SX entry – to Fox Raceway challenging in terms of trying to prepare for the transition.

“Yeah, to be honest, I didn’t really know, like I never raced those guys in the past, so I didn’t really know the level, the speed,” Vialle recalled. “I was very excited for the first race in Pala. You know, I ride my whole life, training a whole winter for motocross and I never rode from September or October until Pala, almost like a month ago. We rode almost only Supercross.

“I didn’t really have a good base riding motocross. It was pretty tough. Those guys are pretty much used to it for many years to switch between two series, but it was pretty tough, also the bike set-up and stuff. I was not lost, but I think I did a few mistakes with the suspension and myself, so I had some ups and downs.

“Of course, this season learning the tracks was not so easy, especially when I didn’t ride the press day. It was pretty tough, straight in the morning. We used to do five or six laps maybe, and then the practice is already done and learning the jumps and the corners wasn’t easy, to be honest.

“I had two good races and some races where I crashed and I couldn’t finish. I missed two races this season, so it’s pretty tough, but nice to finish on the podium for sure for the last one.”

Vialle concluded the 250MX campaign with 3-4 results in round 11, and finished sixth in the championship standings despite being sidelined at Thunder Valley and at Washougal after a moto one fall. He completed 250SX East eighth overall earlier in the year and holds the sixth 250SMX seed ahead of the SuperMotocross World Championship playoffs.

In addition to the change in culture, tracks and racing format in making the switch to the US, Vialle has also had to adapt to the KTM 250 SX-F used in the AMA, with bikes used in the world championship across the board generally further from ‘production’ spec.

“Actually, to be honest, with the new KTM bike, the frame is the same,” Vialle added. “So in Europe and here, we have the same frame. Everyone actually, from the 125 to the 450 is the same frame.

“So, I didn’t change the frame. For sure there’s a few stuff in the engine that we can’t do it here. Makes it a little bit different with the fuel and we don’t run the same fuel in Europe, so for sure, the bike is a little bit different.

“But yeah, like I said, we didn’t train here much before the first race in motocross. So, you cannot discover the bike a little bit before, and I think I made some decisions that were not the best ones, I think with the suspension set-up early in the year. But we ended up on a good set-up and I’m pretty excited for next year.”