2026 Vice World Champions in the Superstock class

September 20, 2026

2026 marked the first full FIM EWC season for Champion HERT powered by MRP #38, following our initial appearance in just two races in 2025. This year’s full campaign spanned four races: a total of 64 grueling hours of flat-out racing, countless laps, and immense dedication from the entire team.

In the end, we fell just short of the Superstock World Championship title, missing top honors by a mere four points to Wójcik Racing Team.

Our goal now is to secure the necessary support for 2027 so we can return to the track, build on this achievement, and put our BMW M1000RR Superstock at the top of the championship standings. We believe nothing less will do.

We extend our sincere thanks to all our loyal sponsors for making our 2026 season possible, as well as our crew, who do everything possible for the team.

Final standings:
Superstock class

1. Wójcik Racing Team 108 pts
2. Champion HERT Powered by MRP 104 pts
3. Honda No Limits 90 pts
4. TRT27 AZ Moto 83 pts
5. Team 18 Pompiers Igil CMS Motostore 73 pts

Rider and team manager reactions:

Erico Casa (Champion HERT powered by MRP – team manager):

For the Bol d’Or race, we met our goals: good testing, strong qualifying, excellent race pace from our four riders, and a high level of performance from the mechanics in the pits and the box.

We led the race for the first 12 hours before disaster struck: the engine began overheating. The bike had to return to the garage to resolve the issue, costing us over an hour and twenty minutes. That’s a long time on the track, yet remarkably short time for removing the engine, installing a new head gasket, and putting the engine back. The mechanics did an incredible job.

Refusing to give up during the second half of the race, our riders delivered superb stints, lapping more than six seconds faster than the competitors ahead of us and charging from last place back up to 11th in class.

However, despite all our efforts, we finished second in the World Championship by a margin of just four points. We should take a page out of the book of our colleagues on the #37 team. They faced the same heartbreak last year, yet this year they won the World Championship title with incredible strength. My warmest congratulations to the entire #37 crew.

I am immensely proud of our team and everything we accomplished throughout the season. We learned a lot, and we will come back even stronger next year. I want to thank Champion Lubricants, HERT, MRP Racing, and all our sponsors. Without them, this magnificent adventure wouldn’t have been possible.

Finally, I want to express my gratitude to Werner and Ben for placing their trust in me as Team Manager. I hope I lived up to the challenge.

Werner Daemen (Champion HERT powered by MRP – team owner):

I think we can be proud of what we’ve achieved! Second in the World Championship in our very first full season. To be honest, in my heart, they are world champions. They had some bad luck, but that’s endurance racing, of course. In the end, taking second place just a few points behind first means they did an excellent job.

Especially for our first year, I’m very pleased with how we worked together with HERT, our Hungarian partners. Everything worked out very well, and every race got better and better. I especially want to give a big thank you to the team here at MRP who worked so hard for this, particularly Erico, who did a tremendous job. This year, he wasn’t just a mechanic, he also took on the role of team manager and did an incredible job.

The plan is to continue in 2027, and I think there’s a strong chance we’ll be title contenders again.

Bálint Kovács (Champion HERT powered by MRP – rider):

The week of the Bol d’Or was really good for us. The whole atmosphere within the team felt just like it did at Le Mans. We knew qualifying isn’t our strongest suit, so we were very happy with P3. so we were quite happy with P3. We were really trusting our race pace, and the work of the team, because in terms of pit stops, I think our team works the best, and if we have issues, they solve it really fast. We were really looking forward to the race, knowing we had the potential to be very strong.

When I started the race, we stayed calm. I brought the bike back in fourth after the first stint, then we climbed to 1st place after I think just one and a half hours. From then on we were leading the race. We got the maximum points for leading at the 8 hours mark. Everything went as planned.

Unfortunately, during the night, we had some technical issues that cost us a lot of time. After that the goal was to climb as many places as we could. To secure the World Championship, we needed either Wójcik to drop out or for us to reach at least P8. We managed to climb back to P11 in Superstock class, which was an amazing achievement by the mechanics, and also from the riders. It was a really demanding race. Ultimately, we finished second in the championship.

We set the goal at the beginning of the season to finish on the podium. I think we reached that, but it’s a bit bittersweet to finish 2nd after leading the championship the whole season. But yeah, it’s Bol d’Or. It’s a really demanding race for both the riders and the bike. I’m really grateful to the team, to everyone involved in this project. Hopefully we can come back stronger. Congratulations to the BMW Factory Team for winning the EWC world title. They know exactly how we feel right now, having been in this same situation last year.

Loris Cresson (Champion HERT powered by MRP – rider):

I’m a bit disappointed how it ended, but we need to reflect on the whole year.Without our issues, I honestly believe we had the potential to win all races, even Suzuka. We always had podium pace, but with a bit more preparation, we could have been contending for victory every time out.

The Bol d’Or week was amazing, the pace was really good. We still need to find a little something in qualifying, but starting third was a solid position. When the hammer went down at the start, the three of us were flying. Jan, Bálint, and I had great pace throughout our stints. Máté was still dealing with his injury, but he did an incredible job whenever he was on the bike.

We know the pace we are capable of, and I think that’s the most frustrating thing. Without being arrogant, we dominated the race, but it’s racing. It is how it is. The team was really amazing in repairing the bike.
The crew was unbelievable in repairing the bike. A huge thank you to the mechanics for their incredible sacrifices; they literally put their bodies on the line for us. I’m so grateful to be part of this team and surrounded by these people. At the end of the day, we are still vice world champions. It’s quite a big achievement. Last year we were third, today we are second, next year we should be first!

Huge thanks to the mechanics and the sacrifices they do, we saw even if they need to burn themselves, they do it. I’m really grateful to be in this team, to be surrounded by all these people.

Congratulations to Werner, Steven, Michael, Reiti, and the entire #37 crew on the title. Big thanks to the whole team, everybody from the mechanics, from Erico, from all the Hungarian side, and also from all the people at the hospitality and the workshop. A special shoutout to Jerry, who was actually there on holiday and still ended up burning his hand on the engine, and to Charles, who suffered some nasty burns on his body helping us out. I’m deeply grateful for all of this. Thank you to everyone, we will keep working harder than ever!

Jan Bühn (Champion HERT powered by MRP – rider):

2nd place is not what we came for, but it’s still a great team achievement! Missing out on the World Cup title by just a few points makes the disappointment even bigger.

A huge thank you to the entire team for the incredible work, commitment, and everything we have achieved together this year! 🙏🏼

Big congratulations to team BMW Motorrad EWC for finally winning the World Championship! 🏆

Máté Számadó (Champion HERT powered by MRP – rider):

We came here with 19 points in the lead so 2nd place wasn’t really the plan, but it was the best we could achieve in this situation.
The whole team, my teammates couldn’t have done a better job, and neither could the mechanics, they did everything they could to ensure success. I’m really proud of them, it’s a shame it turned out this way.

Next year we’re going to be back stronger!
And I’d like to congratulate to the Factory BMW guys for winning the EWC World Title!