Vurb’s 2023 Team Previews: Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull/GASGAS Factory Racing

Welcome to the offseason and our new ongoing “Team Previews” column. Every week from now until the Monster Energy Supercross season starts in January we will be profiling a big team in the sport. We’ll go through the changes that have been made, analyze results, and give each team a grade on all of their offseason moves. This week we have Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull/GASGAS Factory Racing and you will find the full schedule below.

Who’s In:

#51 – Justin Barcia – 450SX/MX
#31 – Michael Mosiman – 250SX/MX
#33- Pierce Brown – 250SX/MX

Who’s Out:

The 2023 team will have the same roster as the 2022 team.

Last season’s Supercross Results:
Barcia – 5th 450SX
Mosiman- 3rd 250SX West
Brown- 3rd 250SX East

Last Season’s Motocross Results:
Barcia – 8th – 450MX
Mosiman – 9th – 250MX
Brown- 10th – 250MX

Offseason Grade:  A

The Rundown:

The GASGAS Factory effort is in a very important year for their 250 program. Both Pierce Brown and Michael Mosiman came up through the KTM umbrella of brands (Mosiman on the Husqvarna amatuer team and Brown on Orange Brigade), and the team has held onto them with the hope that their investments payoff. Well, in 2022 the two riders showed that their development was still on the rise. Each rider showed speed both indoors and out; Mosiman won his first Supercross main event, and then they both tasted the champagne on the podium. 

The downside to having two young riders who aren’t afraid to send it, is that they tend to crash a lot. Both Mosiman and Brown have had their fair share of crashes that lead to inconsistency in the results depending on how hard they hit the ground. Still, without watching the races and seeing their end of the year points standings it all looks great. IF they can eliminate the crashes then we could see one or both of them be in title contention next year.  

Take Mosiman’s growth this outdoor season. When he was on the track and not crashing he finished inside the top five a total of seven times in the motos. He finished within the top ten another five times. Mosiman also only raced nine of the twelve rounds, so out of 18 motos he finished inside the top five in almost half of them. 

As we head into the 2023 season, it’s time for Mosiman and Brown to bring their 250SX titles down to the wire. They need to win and be on the podium every week in order to do this and cut the crashing out of their program. It’s easier said than done, but in a perfect scenario it will pay off for the GASGAS team and prove that holding onto your amatuer prospects is still beneficial in the long run. 

Barcia on the other hand, is now entering his 13th year as a pro. Although, it seems just like yesterday he got the holeshot at Glen Helen in his debut. With Barcia, you know what you’re going to get, especially since he’s a veteran at this point. He’s going to be fast, could podium if the scenario is right, and if the stars align he can get an outdoor win. Barcia even had a chance to get third overall in Supercross this past year. He tried to make a move that wasn’t there on Malcolm Stewart at the series finale in Salt Lake City and was booed out of the stadium. Instead of denying his actions on the podium he embraced them and the stadium booed louder.

The outdoors were a different story for Barcia as he was for the most part a 5-10 guy, which is great in the stacked 450 class that we had this summer, but when dealing with a rider of his caliber you tend to expect more. He only had one podium finish in the second moto at RedBud and his 8-3 day was good enough for third overall on the day. It was his only outdoor overall podium of the summer. It was the first summer since 2019 that he didn’t at least get one moto win. Still, Barcia is a solid top five guy for any team in the pits and given the right set of circumstances can win. He’s also worth a lot to sponsors given his social media following and his vlog series BamTV. Expect more of the same in 2023, which I believe is the last year of his contract, and he seems to always put together a solid season on a contract year. How many more seasons will we see Barcia race? He’s about to become a father, so he could be winding his career down. 

Thanks for reading my series of team previews for the coming season. If you’d like to talk about these or any of the other stories that I’ve written you can email me at [email protected] You can also reach me on Twitter/Instagram: @troydogvurb

Team Preview Schedule:

10/27 – Troy Lee Designs/Red Bull/ GASGAS Factory Race Team

11/2 – Monster Energy Yamaha Star Racing 

11/9 – Rockstar Energy Husqvarna Team

11/16 – Monster Energy Kawasaki Factory Racing

11/23 – HRC Honda

11/30 – Bar X Suzuki

12/7 – Monster Energy Pro Circuit Kawasaki

12/14 – H.E.P. Motorsports Suzuki

12/21 – Muc-Off FXR ClubMX Yamaha

12/28- Red Bull KTM Factory Racing

Main image: GasGas

Written by Troy Dog

Faster than Slaw Dog. Editor-in-Chief

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