Red Bull KTM Racing has signed Max Vohland to a three-year contract that runs through the 2023 season, according to RacerXonline.com.
Earlier this week, Red Bull KTM announced a three-rider lineup that included the return of Marvin Musquin and Cooper Webb in the 450 class with Vohland tagged as their only 250 rider. The length of the contracts were not announced.
This week in an interview with RacerX, Vohland revealed he will race through the 2023 season.
The indoor series was not on the original timeline for his rookie season. Ideally Vohland would have liked to gain some experience in the outdoor Lucas Oil Pro Motocross series first and then tackle the much tighter confines of stadium racing. But sometimes an opportunity comes along that cannot be ignored.
“The plan was to turn pro outdoors in 2021. But with GasGas [Motorcycles] coming in and a couple of things switching up, KTM didn’t have a 250 guy, and Roger [De Coster] and Ian [Harrison] said I was their first pick,” Vohland said. “They gave us an option and said if we weren’t comfortable doing supercross the first year—because a lot of rookies come in and get hurt doing supercross—to just let them know and they would find another guy for supercross. But we weren’t going to give up an offer like that.”
One way to mitigate the danger of getting hurt in the stadium series was to add time to his contact. Should Vohland sustain an injury, he has an extra season to recover and still showcase his skill in the pro ranks.
“We ended up getting an extension of one extra year, through 2023, so it’s not such a risk this first year,” Vohland continued. “No pressure. Got lucky with all of it, but I’m excited about it.”
Max’s father Tallon Vohland was instrumental in the decision to race supercross in 2021.
“I’ve seen people already saying, ‘Hey you guys said you were taking the slow road and now you’re racing supercross,’ ” Tallon said. “We intended to take the slow road. We were thinking of maybe just starting with outdoors, but with this opportunity, you have to do supercross. So we ended up asking for an extra year on our deal.”
