All Japan Motocross Champion Yohei Kojima has joined Team Suzuki World MXGP in their pre-season training programme in Spain.

Kojima, who has been coming over to Europe for the past 10 years, is happy to be back again and will spend until the end of February preparing for his title defence that starts in April. He said: “I will be training with riders who are at the top level in their class; I’m very honoured to be training with them. I really believe that this will make me stronger to defend my title in the Japanese Championship.”

He is training alongside Kevin Strijbos, Ben Townley, plus The Suzuki MX2 riders Jeremy Seewer and Bas Vaessen under the watchful-eye of General Manager Stefan Everts.

Said Everts, who moved the team pre-season testing and training to the south to RedSand MX Park near Valencia due to the cold weather conditions in Belgium: “I’m very happy to have Yohei here with us for training. I’m positive that his preparations will be strong and that they will all benefit from training together.”

The Japanese Champion believes that the training schedule will be good for him, adding: “Practice is hard and very tough every week. Undoubtedly, I will be tired after training, but it will be very good for me as I need to get physically as fit as I can be.”