FIM-E Champions Review – Marcus Christiansen – FIM-E Super Twin Bike
Coming into 2024 the FIM-E Super Twin field was once again trying to knock the dominant father and son pairing of Claus (Speedy) and Marcus Christiansen off their perch, but the season proved to be one of their very best, taking all five event wins. We caught up with Marcus to ask him on his reflections on the year.
Your fifth championship in a row breaks the tie you were in with Anders ‘Charley’ Karling and Per Bengtsson at four titles each, how does that feel?
“It obviously feels great, but I want to beat whoever is still ahead of me too. Haha! It’s very cool to have passed these guys in titles. I grew up watching them race when I was a kid, and back then, it seemed unrealistic to ever think I’d be racing them. But now, I’ve raced Per for a few years, and this year we had the most intense races, meeting in the finals on three occasions throughout the season. I’ve never raced Charley Karling, but it’s really cool to lead him in titles as well—he’s done a lot for the sport.”
Winning all five FIM-E events in 2024 must have been pretty special. What were the highlights?
“Yes, it’s very special. I don’t know if this has happened before, but it’s definitely been the best season we’ve had so far. We had challenges throughout the season, and especially some tricky Sundays, but we made it through all the races without losing a single round. Some days we had luck on our side, and on others, we were in a league of our own. Very cool!!
One highlight was definitely the final at Santa Pod, and really the whole weekend, Saturday and Sunday. We solved our issues, and finally, the bike started responding to the updates we’ve made over the season and last year. We gained a good understanding of how the bike reacts, and there’s no doubt that it has potential for much more. The final, in the dark, side-by-side with Per, flames and all—6.14 seconds—was a really cool experience.”
The fuel system change mid-season caused some challenges. How did you overcome them?
“The new fuel pump delivered a lot more fuel than the bypass system could handle, and at first, we didn’t know that. It made us adjust in the wrong direction during the August race in Tierp, which caused other problems—pretty embarrassing and really stupid. But after Tierp, we made adjustments to the bypass system and regained control over the fuel supply to the engine.”
Plans for next year?
“Same as always—we want to go faster!
We’re still aiming for a record over the season, and now that we have more experience with the bigger fuel pump, I think we’ll push harder to get that record [Bob Malloy’s naturally aspirated ET mark] earlier in the season.
We also have a new project coming up that people can follow on our Facebook page [follow Speedy’s Racing to keep up with the latest happens from the Danish duo]. It’s a 2 to 3 year project, and hopefully, it’ll run fast. It’s a very different concept from what we have today, but we believe in it, and it will be exciting to build.
People are also talking about a world finals event in Canada next year that could be exciting!!”
Six in a row in 2025? Well despite the competition looking to get tougher next season, we wouldn’t bet against it. This would put Marcus into a tie with Roger Pettersson’s lock on the FIM-E Pro Stock Bike championship in the late 90s – early 00s and keep re-writing the record books.
Text and photos: Ivan Sansom & Rose Hughes
