Jonathan Rea and Remy Gardner Light Up the Opening Day of the Yamaha BLU CRU Master Camp
The 2025 Yamaha BLU CRU Master Camp in Valencia kicked off with a bang as Yamaha WorldSBK riders Jonathan Rea and Remy Gardner joined the ten young attendees to share their vast knowledge and experience during the opening day’s training.
The first day of action at the 2025 Yamaha BLU CRU Master Camp saw six-time FIM Superbike World Champion Rea (Pata Maxus Yamaha WorldSBK Team), who recently announced his retirement from full-time racing, plus 2021 Moto2 World Champion and current GYTR GRT Yamaha WorldSBK Team rider Gardner join Alessandro Di Persio (Italy), Christopher Clark (USA), Mario Salles (Brazil), Arai Agaska (Indonesia), Hinata Okada (Japan), Valentino Knezovic (Australia), Thanakit Pratumtong (Thailand), Leonardo Marques (Brazil), Rintaro Takemoto (Japan), and Natalia Rivera (Spain) for the day, creating some incredible memories for the young riders and giving them a chance to learn from their heroes.
Starting the day with a four-hour technical riding session, overseen by coach Kike Bañuls, the BLU CRU riders were put through their paces with several different lessons aimed at helping them refine their technique, including specific drills designed to improve their bike control, overtaking methods, and even how to recover their bike and restart a race after a crash.
In the afternoon, it was the turn of flat track expert Marco Belli, along with mentors Rea and Gardner, as the BLU CRU riders hit the flat track circuit at the Aspar Motorsport complex. With two world champions to show them the way and on hand to offer advice, the young riders demonstrated rapid improvement, and there were plenty of smiles to be found at the end of the day.
Day two of the Yamaha BLU CRU Master Camp will see participants start the day with another flat track session, once again with Rea acting as a mentor. They will then swap the dirt for water as they sample some fun away from the Aspar Circuit by riding Yamaha WaveRunners at the Valencia Marina under the watchful eye of coach, multi-time IJSBA World Champion Chris MacClugage, while joining them in the afternoon will be another star rider in the shape of Alex Rins from the Monster Energy Yamaha MotoGP team.
Jonathan Rea
Pata Maxus Yamaha WorldSBK Official Team
“It was a really cool day! Especially because a lot of the riders had never done flat track before, and even after tough technical training sessions this morning, they impressed me. It was fun to ride with them and teach them about flat track, as while it uses a different skillset, those skills are transferable to road racing, as flat track is all about losing traction, and in road racing, that happens a lot, and it’s how you react to it with your body that matters. Hence, many riders use off-road riding and flat track to hone their skills, so it was really nice to hit the track with the BLU CRU riders. It was a demanding day for them, but to see so many smiling faces at the end made it all worthwhile. The Yamaha BLU CRU Master Camp has really impressed me. You can see the effort that has gone into the event, and it demonstrates Yamaha’s commitment to developing the next generation of world champions.”
Posted on August 30, 2025 by Michael Le Pard
