The teenager had already displayed his outrageous speed during Qualifying as he lapped three seconds faster than any of his MX2 rivals and sensationally claimed the Superpole on his Kawasaki KX250-SR by one-and-a-half seconds against the top MX1 riders on their 450s. He missed victory in the first MX2 moto by less than a second after reeling in the leader at more than a second per lap after racing up the leaderboard from a slip during the early stages of the race. Race two was a different story as he took the holeshot, running away with the moto victory by more than half-a-minute before clinching overall success with seventh - and best MX2 - in the combined MX1/MX2 Superfinal.
 
Mathis Valin: « It was a good day at Sommières; I had a good feeling with the track all day long. I was able to post very good lap times, with a gap to my rivals, and in the Superpole I was the fastest ahead of the 450 guys so I was very happy! I came through the pack to battle with the Reisulis brothers in the first moto until I made a mistake and fell; I had a little pain in my arms but I could come back to second at the finish. I grabbed the holeshot in the second moto and won, then we had the Superfinal with the 450s; it was a tough one as I was around twentieth at the start but I pushed hard and was the fastest guy on the track in the last five minutes to come back to seventh. Overall it was a great day and I had fun on this nice track."
 
Valin's Kawasaki Racing Team MXGP colleague Pauls Jonass had narrowly missed MX1 pole by less than a tenth of a second during morning Qualifying. The Latvian was fourth overall in the afternoon after 4-4-5 moto finishes in a series of close-fought races amongst the GP riders.
 
Pauls Jonass: "It's been some time since I raced a hard-pack track like this so I was really pleased when I started the day with second in Timed Practice. I got good starts in both MX1 motos and ran second until I had a small tip-over each time to finish fourth. I missed the start in the Superfinal but came back through to fifth so it was a good training day and I'm happy to have got another race under my belt before we head to Argentina."
 
Team Venum Bud Racing Kawasaki's Francisco Garcia and Jake Cannon, who will again race the European EMX2 championship this season, enjoyed their first race of the year in MX2.
After losing a lap in an incident in the sticky conditions in race one, the Spaniard bounced back in style in race two to finish second to Valin, the only rider to lap faster than either of the Bud Racing duo. Garcia completed his day as second-fastest MX2 rider in the combined MX1/MX2 Superfinal to classify fourth on the day despite his first-moto misfortune. His Australian teammate rode two solid MX2 motos to post 6-5 moto finishes against GP competition to clinch fifth overall.