Former World Champion heaps “most dominant” praise on Jake Dixon

The 2025 Moto2 season has seen several big names jump ship from Kalex to Boscoscuro chassis in the wake of the Italian constructor’s first world title with Ai Ogura last year, and after only two races Jake Dixon has won his first race aboard his new bike.

2025’s first Moto2 round saw Celestino Vietti stand out among the Boscoscuro riders, the Italian being the only rider aboard the Italian frame in Thailand to battle for the podium before crashing out of contention thanks to contact with Senna Agius.

But the Argentinian Grand Prix saw a level of domination from Jake Dixon that the British rider was never able to demonstrate on the Kalex, winning by 3.525 seconds over Thailand winner Manuel Gonzalez.

“It was the most dominant performance of his Grand Prix career,” said TNT Sports presenter and former World Superbike Champion Neil Hodgson, speaking after the Argentina race.

“He’s in his seventh season in Moto2, and what a time to start shining. Even his interviews seem different.

“Sometimes his interviews were a bit [of a word salad] in the past, and I know why: because he was trying to say the right things in the past and sometimes you could sort of tell deep down he didn’t quite believe what he was saying.

“Obviously, we’ve witnessed that, we’ve witnessed the growth. What he’s done, he’s had to really take a step back, be vulnerable, seek some outside help from the psychology side of racing, which – I talk about a lot – is key.

“We know he’s got the skill, he’s got the technique, so it’s really good to see it pay off.”

One of the technical changes Dixon made for the Argentina weekend was the addition of a thumb-operated rear brake to his rider cockpit.

TNT Sports MotoGP analyst Michael Laverty explained that, while it’s clearly been a good adaptation to the thumb brake for Dixon, it’s not a solution that’s straightforward to introduce.

“It takes a while to reprogramme your brain to use the thumb brake,” Laverty said.

“He probably has a dual system on there where he can use the foot [or] the thumb, but then he knows where there’s a little bit more to gain from the thumb brake, which is at maximum lean angle in right-handers you can really use it to turn.

“It’s a work in progress for him, but the fact that he put it on for the first time this weekend from FP1 and then he had the weekend that he had, I think [he should keep it].”