: Laia Sanz will not compete in the Trial World Championship. After 13 world titles in this specialty, the KH-7 rider has decided to retire to focus exclusively on enduro and the Dakar Rally.
The decision was made public a day before the start of the 2014 championship in Belgium, although for some months the best motorcycle rider of all time had assumed her resignation.
“I don’t know if it’s goodbye or see you later, but it’s true that this year I’m taking a break and we’ll see,” says Laia without resigning herself to abandoning the sport that made her famous. “It was a very difficult decision to make but with the competition calendars that exist, it was impossible to combine enduro and trial. I think going for enduro is the right decision.”Go on.
There are several reasons for this. On the one hand, the coincidence of calendars prevented him from opting to repeat the trial and enduro titles and, in fact, last year he already had to figure out how to contest the decisive races of both championships in the same weekend. This time, however, there was no room for a repeat of the 2013 carom.
On the other hand, the physical and mental demands of preparing three different modalities, if we add the rally-raid, had greatly reduced the rest times of the Catalan. That even caused the appearance of some injuries, such as tendinitis in his left elbow – for which he underwent surgery about three months ago – which he had to endure in the 2014 Dakar and the first round of the 2014 enduro world championship.
“It’s difficult to combine three specialties. Riders who do well in the Dakar only prepare for the Dakar and the same goes for enduro or trial riders. I was doing three things at once and in the end my body suffers. I’ve been practically non-stop for several years and I was lacking rest, which is an important part of training. The elbow injury was a warning that I needed to loosen up a bit and it helped me make the decision.” Assumes.
Despite this, the KH-7 pilot saw herself “with the strength to continue winning,” she says. “The problem is that I don’t have much time to train and trial is the motor sport that requires the most hours on the bike. It’s very technical and difficult, and to be well you have to train for many hours, something that wasn’t possible right now. In addition, enduro is more similar to the Dakar and easier to reconcile. The enduro technique then helps me prepare for the Dakar. On the other hand, trial is very different and requires a very different physical preparation.” Explains.
Source: Laia Sanz press
