ÁGUEDA (Portugal) 28th June 2026 – The halfway stage of the season has been reached at the Crossdromo Internaçional de Águeda, as the MXGP of Portugal hosted a stunning tenth round of the 2026 FIM World Motocross Championships, under slightly cooler conditions than yesterday, which allowed the packed grandstands and hillsides of fans to put out even more energy as the atmosphere built around the famous orange dirt of the Portuguese venue!
In an instantly classic duel of the titans, Honda HRC Petronas’ Jeffrey Herlings took a record sixth overall GP victory at Águeda, turning the tables on his young rival Lucas Coenen, who took second for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing, finishing on the same points for the day after the pair shared the top two positions in each race. Romain Febvre took his fourth straight podium finish at this venue, clinching third overall with two third places for Kawasaki Racing Team MXGP.
In MX2, Guillem Farres gained redemption from the series’ previous visit to the Iberian Peninsula, and completed a perfect weekend of three race victories for himself and the Triumph Racing Factory Team. He was followed by Janis Reisulis, who climbed his first career Grand Prix podium with second overall for Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2. Championship leader Sacha Coenen bounced back from a big first race crash to take third overall for Red Bull KTM Factory Racing, although his Championship lead took a major cut thanks to Farres’ 1-1-1 scoreline.
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Head Photo: Jeffrey Herlings; Top Photo: MXGP Start Portugal 2026
Lucas Coenen & Jeffrey Herlings battling for the lead
Jeffrey Herlings once more took the fastest time in the morning Warm-Up session, with Pauls Jonass second fastest for Kawasaki Racing Team MXGP. Tom Vialle was third fastest for Honda HRC Petronas.
From his ninth gate pick, Vialle fired across the bows of the whole field to take the Fox Holeshot Award through the first corner, but Lucas Coenen was directly in his wheel-tracks, and made a decisive move in the corner after the finish line jump to gain the immediate advantage! Behind him, local favourite Ruben Fernandez moved into third for Honda HRC Petronas past Romain Febvre, but Herlings had lost traction in the second corner and had to fight from around eighth position!
“The Bullet” fought tenaciously past Febvre through the newly-profiled wave section to get into fourth place, but his progress was stunted for a few laps. On lap three, Fernandez put a typically aggressive move to wrestle second from Vialle. While Coenen had sprinted away to lead by around four seconds, he undid that work with a mistake on a downhill corner, dropping the bike momentarily and clambering back on again just as Fernandez came past! In just the very next corner though, the Belgian reset the order with a direct inside move to retake the lead!
Herlings had got past Vialle to move into third, but was unable to shift his other teammate Fernandez until as late as lap eight, by which time the Belgian teenager had stretched out a ten second lead over his pursuers. Febvre also got past the Spaniard a lap later on the same corner, and Tim Gajser had moved into fifth for Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MXGP.
Vialle was sixth ahead of Jonass, then came Gajser’s teammate Maxime Renaux, Red Bull KTM Factory Racing’s Andrea Adamo, and the Gabriel SS24 KTM of Oriol Oliver. Vialle, still racing himself back into fitness from his French GP injuries, dropped steadily to 11th, before a small crash put him back to 15th at the flag.
Herlings did all he could to haul in Coenen, but could only get to within four seconds of his title rival. Gajser put a nice outside-to-inside move on Fernandez to pull a block pass just before a downhill triple jump, which put him into fourth behind Febvre. Jonass took sixth ahead of Renaux, Adamo, Oliver, and Calvin Vlaanderen rounded out the top ten for the Red Bull Ducati Factory MXGP Team.
In a carbon copy of the first race start, Vialle pulled yet another Fox Holeshot, the 65th of his career, with Coenen again giving chase ahead of Jonass and Fernandez. Herlings was around eighth through the second turn but determined to not let Coenen get away, and carved up to fourth past Gajser by the time they roared past Pit Lane! In the next couple of corners, the entire top five got shaken up by several overtakes that happened almost exactly at the same time! Coenen was able to fire around the outside of Vialle to lead the way again, just as Herlings pulled a similar move to relieve Jonass of third, and Gajser took advantage of a stumbling Fernandez to claim fifth! Then through the old wave section Herlings closed in on Vialle to put in a decisive block pass on the Frenchman, giving us a showdown between the two title combatants right from the first full lap!
The second lap saw moves further back, as Gajser, Fernandez, and Febvre all worked past Jonass to put the Latvian into seventh ahead of Adamo. Then Oliver passed Vlaanderen to put them into their positions from race one. Unfortunately for the Spaniard, his good day as top privateer was cut short by a breakdown on lap seven, lifting Renaux into the top ten.
Up front, Gajser and Febvre had got past Vialle into third and fourth by lap six, with Fernandez also passing his teammate a lap later. All eyes were on the leaders, however, as Herlings closed up on Coenen, and the pair engaged in a thrilling side-by-side combat for half of an amazing lap eight! After being closed off a couple of times, “The Bullet” shot to the inside of the Belgian in a sharp right-hander and almost came to a stop in a move that gave his rival a single option, to close the throttle!
Jeffrey sprinted away from here, and Lucas had no answer to his pace. Febvre stalked Gajser, and the Slovenian got crossed up on a rough uphill, crashing without harm and handing the reigning Champion third place to secure his podium result. Gajser and Fernandez were again fourth and fifth to finish in those positions in the overall GP. Jonass took sixth on the day, his second-best result of the 2026 campaign.
Adamo claimed seventh in race two to put himself there overall, while Vlaanderen took eighth in race two ahead of Renaux, although the Frenchman came out on top between them by a single point. Kevin Horgmo, who never stopped charging all day for Team Honda Motoblouz SR Motul, took tenth to finish there overall as the best privateer for the GP.
After a stunning show of raw pace, the top two in the series now lie 57 points apart, as Herlings refuses to let Coenen rack up the wins when he can do something about it. The Dutchman extends his GP win record to 117 in total, and yet again continues to be able to out-do his rival on hard-pack circuits. How will the pair of them deal with the complete unknown of the next round in South Africa? It’s an intriguing question that demands the attention of Motocross fans worldwide!
Jeffrey Herlings: “I felt like me and Lucas were roughly the same speed all weekend. In race one I lost a lot of time with my teammate Ruben, I spent a longtime trying to pass him and Lucas went ahead. In race two I was straight into second after one lap, and I felt I was a bit faster at some points, but it was very difficult to find a line to pass. I found one spot where I could do it, and I made sure to stop him from going around me. I pushed a few laps, made a nice little gap and managed to win. GP number 117, race win 221, the stats keep getting impressive, but it's been a nice weekend and I look forward to South Africa.”
Lucas Coenen: “The key is to be smart. I think I did the best weekend I could to win the overall. In race one I was running pretty good and felt ready. In race two I was just trying to control it, I knew Jeffrey wanted to win and he needed to, so I felt like I was being smart and not really pushing. At one moment I made a mistake and didn't jump the triple; I slowed down but Jeffrey went really close and I had to stop otherwise I was going down. Second overall, I gotta keep pushing and be consistent. I'm young, so I can learn from the best, and that's the main thing.”
Romain Febvre: “I felt pretty good straight away from Saturday. It was good to have a nice track with a lot of grip and nice jumps, for two years in a row it was a muddy one, so I was glad to have a good weekend like this. The two guys at the front were faster in almost every session, so it's hard, but I'm there and I try to close the gap every time. In race two my start was not good and I was quite far back, but I saw Gajser ahead and thought I need to make passes quick or I won't catch him. Two times third, finally two good races. My riding was better and I'm really happy.”
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1.Lucas Coenen; 2. Romain Febvre
MXGP - Grand Prix Race 1 - Top 10 Classification: 1. Lucas Coenen (BEL, KTM), 35:12.425; 2. Jeffrey Herlings (NED, Honda), +0:03.672; 3. Romain Febvre (FRA, Kawasaki), +0:28.435; 4. Tim Gajser (SLO, Yamaha), +0:30.512; 5. Ruben Fernandez (ESP, Honda), +0:37.194; 6. Pauls Jonass (LAT, Kawasaki), +0:52.973; 7. Maxime Renaux (FRA, Yamaha), +1:02.418; 8. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), +1:10.489; 9. Oriol Oliver (ESP, KTM), +1:13.153; 10. Calvin Vlaanderen (NED, Ducati), +1:17.288;
MXGP - Grand Prix Race 2 – Top 10 Classification: 1. Jeffrey Herlings (NED, Honda), 35:36.420; 2. Lucas Coenen (BEL, KTM), +0:06.203; 3. Romain Febvre (FRA, Kawasaki), +0:16.060; 4. Tim Gajser (SLO, Yamaha), +0:20.583; 5. Ruben Fernandez (ESP, Honda), +0:38.907; 6. Pauls Jonass (LAT, Kawasaki), +0:53.326; 7. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), +1:08.555; 8. Calvin Vlaanderen (NED, Ducati), +1:10.501; 9. Maxime Renaux (FRA, Yamaha), +1:16.188; 10. Kevin Horgmo (NOR, Honda), +1:16.552;
MXGP Overall – Top 10 Classification: . Jeffrey Herlings (NED, HON), 47 points; 2. Lucas Coenen (BEL, KTM), 47 p.; 3. Romain Febvre (FRA, KAW), 40 p.; 4. Tim Gajser (SLO, YAM), 36 p.; 5. Ruben Fernandez (ESP, HON), 32 p.; 6. Pauls Jonass (LAT, KAW), 30 p.; 7. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), 27 p.; 8. Maxime Renaux (FRA, YAM), 26 p.; 9. Calvin Vlaanderen (NED, DUC), 24 p.; 10. Kevin Horgmo (NOR, HON), 20 p.
MXGP - World Championship Classification: 1. Lucas Coenen (BEL, KTM), 506 points; 2. Jeffrey Herlings (NED, HON), 449 p.; 3. Romain Febvre (FRA, KAW), 394 p.; 4. Tim Gajser (SLO, YAM), 371 p.; 5. Maxime Renaux (FRA, YAM), 334 p.; 6. Andrea Adamo (ITA, KTM), 313 p.; 7. Ruben Fernandez (ESP, HON), 304 p.; 8. Kay de Wolf (NED, HUS), 273 p.; 9. Tom Vialle (FRA, HON), 265 p.; 10. Pauls Jonass (LAT, KAW), 234 p.
MXGP - Manufacturers Classification: 1. Honda, 532 points; 2. KTM, 526 p.; 3. Yamaha, 452 p.; 4. Kawasaki, 419 p.; 5. Husqvarna, 284 p.; 6. Ducati, 214 p.; 7. Fantic, 210 p.; 8. Beta, 90 p.; 9. Triumph, 70 p.; 10. GASGAS, 4 p.
MXGP Podium Portugal 2026
Guillem Farres
In complete contrast to his brother, Sacha Coenen pressed on in the morning Warm-Up session to set the fastest time, with yesterday’s Qualifying Race winner Guillem Farres in second. The only rider in the class to have previously won a GP here, Liam Everts, took third for Nestaan Husqvarna Factory Racing.
Taking a surprise Fox Holeshot Award, for the first time in his career, was Julius Mikula of the Osička KTM MX Team! The Czech celebrated over the finish line, but he had already been overtaken by Farres through the second corner, although he continued to harass the Spaniard throughout the first lap!
Behind them came Coenen, but the Belgian got the wave section badly wrong, resulting in a big crash that he was lucky to escape from uninjured, although it put him off the track and having to restart from outside the top twenty! Janis Reisulis inherited third ahead of defending Champion Simon Längenfelder, and the Maddi Racing Honda ABF Italia of Maxime Grau.
Camden McLellan suffered a poor start, and had to recover to seventh at the end of the first full lap behind Everts, and ahead of the Honda HRC Petronas machine of Valerio Lata, the ASA United GASGAS of Briton Ben Mustoe, and the Dixon Racing Kawasaki of Kay Karssemakers.
Janis was able to make a sweet outside to inside pass on Mikula to take second on lap two, and his brother Karlis Reisulis got into the top ten for Monster Energy Yamaha Factory MX2, at the expense of Karssemakers, at around the same time.
Mikula had to give way to some of the factory riders, as Längenfelder made an inside move for third on lap five, then McLellan took fourth on lap seven. Sadly for Grau, fighting hard in fifth, he suffered a technical failure and came to a stop as he started lap six.
Coenen staged a fantastic recovery to put Mustoe out of the top ten on lap five, and his final pass on Mikula took him to sixth, behind Everts, with four laps to go. Lata finished in eighth behind the Czech, and a solid race from Ferruccio Zanchi put him into ninth for the Beddini Racing Ducati Factory MX2 Team. Karlis Reisulis rounded out the top ten.
His brother Janis, at a circuit where he had previously won three out of the four EMX races he competed in, held on to his career best GP race finish of second, ahead of Champ Längenfelder and McLellan. However, no-one was getting near Farres, who matched Sacha Coenen’s 2026 race win total with his sixth of the season!
The Spaniard, and clear crowd favourite, gave himself the best chance of sealing the perfect weekend with a clear Fox Holeshot in race two, and Janis Reisulis was right with him as the Latvian was striving for the podium! Coenen was initially second, but two mistakes on the first downhill put him down to fourth behind Mikula, although the Belgian rectified that to retake third after a few corners.
Mikula then had an entertaining back and forth battle with Everts that lasted a couple of laps before the Husqvarna man finished the job in front of Pit Lane. Längenfelder was behind them in sixth, with Karssemakers, Karlis Reisulis, McLellan and Lata completing the top ten.
The Champ was able to get around the Czech for fifth soon after, and McLellan began another charge from a below-average start, getting to sixth on lap six as Mikula landed off track in the waves section and dropped to tenth behind Karlis, Kay, and Valerio!
Sadly for Lata, he pulled into Pit Lane to retire on lap nine, lifting the SB Racing KTM of Jens Walvoort into the top ten, where he would finish behind Mikula, Karssemakers in eighth, and Karlis Reisulis in seventh.
Coenen was on a charge to try and limit the points damage to the runaway Farres, and he chopped across the front of Janis Reisulis to take second on lap 11. Everts, after nearly being thrown from his Husqvarna through the wave section on lap 14, caught back up to the teenage Latvian to take third a lap later! By that time, McLellan had pounced on Längenfelder to grab fifth from the German.
Zanchi had got taken down in a collision with Venrooy KTM Racing’s Noel Zanocz, and was relegated to eleventh overall, although Brit Ollie Colmer took a career best GP finish of 12th for Chambers KTM, just ahead of Mustoe. Walvoort had done enough to claim tenth overall behind Karssemakers, with Karlis Reisulis eighth behind Mikula.
McLellan’s rough starts limited him to sixth overall behind Längenfelder, and he remains two points behind the German in the battle for third in the Championship. Everts claimed fourth on the day, as both him and Janis Reisulis jumped up in the Championship ahead of Mathis Valin, who missed today’s races due to the impact of his big crash while leading the Qualifying Race for Kawasaki Racing Team MX2, but looks possible to line up in South Africa.
Coenen’s charge had been enough to see him take his seventh podium of the year, but his points lead has been by 14 points to 32 over the course of the weekend. Janis Reisulis did a suitably strange dance to celebrate his first career podium, and you get the feeling that it’s the first of many!
The second career GP victory for Farres, however, was an emphatic one, and he is emerging as the biggest threat to Sacha Coenen in this year’s Championship, although his teammate will be more fired up than ever next weekend as he races a GP on home soil for the very first time!
The enthralling MX2 World Championship has many twists and turns ahead as we head to the Southern Hemisphere to start the second half of the season. There is so much racing ahead of us, and we wouldn’t have it any other way! Join us as we head to South Africa for round 11 next weekend!
Guillem Farres: “I feel great, it's really nice to get a perfect weekend, and this is my first ever perfect weekend. This GP is also special because it's close to Spain, so I had my family here and a bunch of friends showed up as a surprise. I haven't changed a thing the whole weekend, which gives me a lot of extra confidence when riding. We did a lot of work this winter and for some reason on hard pack tracks I haven't touched a single clicker all year. The most important thing is not winning every weekend, it's minimizing the bad days. On the good days everything is easier; on the bad days is when the real champion shows up.”
Janis Reisulis: “I was feeling very calm this weekend. The last two races were not how I really wanted, so I went in with nothing to lose and just went for it. Two quite good starts helped me and I was feeling really good on the track, nice flow and I was just keeping it in control. In EMX you can sometimes relax at the end of a race, but in MX2 the intensity at the end is sometimes even higher than at the beginning, and that's what I've been losing in the early part of the season. This weekend gave me a lot of experience keeping up at the front in the last laps. I'm slowly getting into this class.”
Sacha Coenen: “I started not too bad in race one, was in third, but then I made a mistake and went down, and came back from last to sixth which was quite difficult because the track was wet and slippery, you couldn't make a mistake because it was really fast for everyone. In race two I had a not too bad start, stayed in third for quite a long time, made a move into second place and tried to come back, but Guillem passed me so I couldn't catch him. Third overall was not really bad for a bad weekend, let's say. I just had some issues dealing with the front at times, but it is what it is.”
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1. Janis Reisulis; 2. Sacha Coenen
MX2 - Grand Prix Race 1 - Top 10 Classification: 1. Guillem Farres (ESP, Triumph), 35:01.379; 2. Janis Martins Reisulis (LAT, Yamaha), +0:04.641; 3. Simon Längenfelder (GER, KTM), +0:07.761; 4. Camden Mc Lellan (RSA, Triumph), +0:08.652; 5. Liam Everts (BEL, Husqvarna), +0:09.423; 6. Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), +0:33.661; 7. Julius Mikula (CZE, KTM), +0:40.674; 8. Valerio Lata (ITA, Honda), +0:54.120; 9. Ferruccio Zanchi (ITA, Ducati), +0:57.102; 10. Karlis Alberts Reisulis (LAT, Yamaha), +1:05.493;
MX2 - Grand Prix Race 2 – Top 10 Classification: 1. Guillem Farres (ESP, Triumph), 35:00.046; 2. Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), +0:11.717; 3. Liam Everts (BEL, Husqvarna), +0:30.984; 4. Janis Martins Reisulis (LAT, Yamaha), +0:34.502; 5. Camden Mc Lellan (RSA, Triumph), +0:45.394; 6. Simon Längenfelder (GER, KTM), +0:50.426; 7. Karlis Alberts Reisulis (LAT, Yamaha), +0:52.293; 8. Kay Karssemakers (NED, Kawasaki), +1:20.236; 9. Julius Mikula (CZE, KTM), +1:25.086; 10. Jens Walvoort (NED, KTM), +1:56.275
MX2 Overall – Top 10 Classification: 1. Guillem Farres (ESP, TRI), 50 points; 2. Janis Martins Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 40 p.; 3. Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), 37 p.; 4. Liam Everts (BEL, HUS), 36 p.; 5. Simon Längenfelder (GER, KTM), 35 p.; 6. Camden Mc Lellan (RSA, TRI), 34 p.; 7. Julius Mikula (CZE, KTM), 26 p.; 8. Karlis Alberts Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 25 p.; 9. Kay Karssemakers (NED, KAW), 21 p.; 10. Jens Walvoort (NED, KTM), 21 p.
MX2 - World Championship Classification: . Sacha Coenen (BEL, KTM), 477 points; 2. Guillem Farres (ESP, TRI), 445 p.; 3. Simon Längenfelder (GER, KTM), 415 p.; 4. Camden Mc Lellan (RSA, TRI), 413 p.; 5. Liam Everts (BEL, HUS), 397 p.; 6. Janis Martins Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 355 p.; 7. Mathis Valin (FRA, KAW), 352 p.; 8. Karlis Alberts Reisulis (LAT, YAM), 273 p.; 9. Valerio Lata (ITA, HON), 256 p.; 10. Kay Karssemakers (NED, KAW), 205 p.
MX2 - Manufacturers Classification: 1. KTM, 539 points; 2. Triumph, 526 p.; 3. Kawasaki, 400 p.; 4. Husqvarna, 397 p.; 5. Yamaha, 384 p.; 6. Honda, 298 p.; 7. Ducati, 114 p.; 8. TM, 87 p.; 9. GASGAS, 42 p.; 10. Fantic, 8 p
MX2 Podium Portugal 2026
All the photos from the MXGP of Portugal will be available HERE.
You can find the complete results HERE.
MXGP OF PORTUGAL QUICK FACTS:
Circuit length: 1575m
Type of ground: Sand
Temperature: 26°
Weather conditions: Sunny
Crowd attendance: 23,000
LINKS
Infront Moto Racing
FIM
FIM Europe
MXGP Portugal
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