MXA MINI-VIEW: ANTONIO BALBI

Antonio Balbi  is a motocross/Supercross rider from Brazil. Some of his career accomplishments include the 2004 and 2008 Brazilian Supercross MX1 championships, the Brazilian outdoor MX1 championship, the Latin-American championship in MX2 as well as 5th place in Daytona during the 2008 AMA Supercross season and a 5th at Unadilla during the AMA Nationals (both 450 class).

What have you been up to lately? It has been a long time since I raced here in the US. I lived here from 2006 to 2010 and since then I have been racing the Brazilian Nationals. I’m from Brazil so I race the Brazilian championship back home along with doing riding schools to keep busy. I ride when I get a chance. I still have a house here in California, so I come and ride to get ready for the championship back home that starts in April.

How are the riding schools going? The schools are going well back home. I made myself a pretty decent name. The time I was racing here in the US really helped a lot. Many Brazilian people followed  what was happening in the US and I was doing really well here. I had some top 10s, and top 5s in Supercross and outdoors so I become well known. Plus, having the 7 or 8 National championships back home attracted a lot of people to the schools. Right now I have been training a lot of kids, but I still find still time to race. It has been busy, but it has been fun.

Any big difference between Brazilian soil and US soil? To be honest, here everything is soft and the tracks are a lot faster than in Brazil.  Over there we ride a lot of hard packed tracks and they are really tight. It is a different environment, but it is still the motorcycle and the rider.

When is your next big race? The first round of the Brazilian Nationals is on April 10. Last year we had two championships in Brazil. I had a good year in 2015 with winning one of the championships.