BN Racing, an adaptive bike team, will make its debut at the Silk Way Rally with the opening stage on Sunday. The team is fielding four bikes in the race: a Husqvarna FS 450 and KTM 450 EXC-F for cofounders Anton Kruglov and Anton Rene, along with a Husqvarna FE 450 for Alexander Makarov and KTM 450 EXC-F for Evgeny Ozol.

Makarov has a prosthetic left hand while Ozol uses a hip prosthesis; both of them have a standard prosthesis for daily use as well as another for riding. Despite their conditions, the former has experience in enduro and motocross whereas the latter is a para snowboarder. The pair, along with their team owners, raced the Gold of Kagan earlier this year.

Both of their bikes comply with regulation but also have modifications to accommodate their conditions. Makarov’s Husqvarna has the throttle and front brake on the left handlebar rather than the traditional right. On Ozol’s KTM, the rear brake—usually a pedal—is on the handlebar underneath the clutch instead. Ozol compared his system to a “large pneumatic spring”.

Other upgrades had to be made to better withstand the Silk Way’s marathon conditions such as strengthening the navigation tower and Ozol’s hip prosthesis.

Kruglov has won the Gold of Kagan thrice, including the most recent edition, and finished third in G-Moto at the 2024 SWR. Rene is mainly an enduro rider.

“We want to show that no trauma, no diagnosis can kill a dream if it is real,” Kruglov told Sports.ru.

The team is the first adaptive bike outfit to compete at the Silk Way. Adaptive racing programs and teams consisting of competitors with disabilities also exist in other parts of the world; this year’s Mint 400 Motorcycle Race had Big Iron, a trio of American military veterans with leg prostheses.

With Kruglov being the only person of the quartet with SWR experience and the G-Moto Challenge class being essentially a malle moto category, their goal is to reach the finish together than to compete for the win.

“I’m an orthopedic doctor myself, and I want people who’ve been through a limb amputation at any level to understand that this is a treatable problem,” Kruglov commented in a special with Vesti-Irkutsk. “It is possible to recover so much that you can then participate in the biggest, most important, toughest sports events on par with everyone else.”

Featured image credit: Vesti-Irkutsk