Patrick Hansen finished previous World U-21 Individual Championship cycle on 5th position. This year he has a chance to improve his result. Although Hansen didn’t win the promotion from eliminations, organizers decided to give him the wild card.
19-year old rider started this season quite well. He’s certain that he’ll fight for the World U-21 and European U-19 champion title. Futhermore, Hansen is becoming more and more important for Danish National Team coach, what resulted by vocation to the senior team.
- My season has been really good. I qualified for World and European Championships u-21 and I'm also in senior team. But yes, apparently it hasn't been good enough for any of my teams either in Poland or Denmark, which is really sad for me as it's impossible for me to improve my skills when I'm not riding – said Hansen.
Promotion to World U-21 individual Championship was very important for Hansen. Unfortunately, he was not happy after eliminations in Pardubice. In one race he had a failure and because of that he finished competition with only 10 points, which weren’t enough to advance to finals. Hansen finished 6th In Pardubice. Fortunately organizers appreciated his performance and gave him a wild card for World U-21 Individual Championship 2017.
Yes, it was a big goal for me to qualify. Unfortunately I had bad luck with bike defect in one heat, but happily I got wild card. It's hard to set a target as I haven't been riding for any teams this year, so I don't really know where I stand, but I will go out and do my best – he added.
Dane thinks that this year U-21 Championship startlist is very strong. We have to recall, that in the part of tournament four Polish riders will be present – Kacper Woryna, Dominik Kubera, Maksym Drabik and Bartosz Smektała.
I think that this year seems to have a harder lineup. I think it's going to bring some great racing and I'm really excited for it – said Hansen.
First World U-21 Individual Championship will take place on July 23rd in Poznań. So far, Hansen hadn’t any possibility to start there. Despite this, he’s doing everything what he can to know the track in the biggest Greater-Poland city.
- I have only been able to watch some videos from it. Unfortunately my Polish team didn't want to use me when they had competition there. But I am Frederik Jakobsen’s good friend and he told me a bit about it, because he rides for this club – added Dane.
Hansen regrets that he can’t show his skills in Polish league. Until now, Speed Car Motor Lublin coach has been using only Robert Lambert and Bjarne Pedersen as the foreign riders. Interestingly, Lambert can’t come to Poland too often due to meetings in United Kingdom and Lublin’s activists replace him by Stanisław Burza.
- Yes, I am definitely really disappointed to be honest. I understand that when Bjarne and Lambert are free, they choose them. But Lambert rides in UK often, and I thought this should be my chance. But unfortunately they rather wanted to use old Polish riders who doesn't score more than 4-6 points. So yes, I am definitely disappointed, but I hope they will give me a chance – added Hansen.
At the end, it is worth mentioning that talented Dane is looking up to Darcy Ward. Hansen regrets that Australian rider won’t come back on the track and he can’t watch him in action.
- My idol was definitely Darcy Ward. I got really inspired by his racing and I tried to kind of copy it a bit. And probably that's how I learned to pass other riders in a spectacular way like we saw last year in, for example, Pardubice and Gdansk. My big dream is to be as good as he was. It's really sad for me that he's not riding anymore. But I also started to like Dudek last year. He was my team mate in Esbjerg and he's a really nice guy who is also really great on a speedway bike! – finished Hansen.
First round of World U-21 Individual Championship will take place on July 23rd at 17:00 in Poznań.
