Main image courtesy of Racer X Archives.
André Malherbe, one of the all-time great motocross racers from Belgium, passed away yesterday at the age of 66. Malherbe had been suffering from an illness that saw him hospitalized earlier this month.
Malherbe was a three-time 500cc World Motocross Champion in the 1980s with Team Honda HRC, as well as a two-time 125cc European Motocross Champion while racing a Zundapp. He was also a member of three winning Belgian teams in the FIM Motocross of Nations. At the time of his retirement from motocross (1986), Malherbe was fourth on the all-time winners’ list for GP motocross with 41 total wins.
Following his retirement from professional motocross, Malherbe raced both touring cars as well as the Paris-Dakar Rally in Africa aboard adventure bikes. It was during the ’88 Rally that Malherbe crashed and suffered a catastrophic neck injury that left him quadriplegic. He continued to attend races throughout the rest of his life.
The FIM stated that, “Malherbe inspired respect, a true gentleman on and off the track. He was one of the Motocross greats of the eighties. His battles with Hakan Carlqvist and Dave Thorpe are legendary.”
Sadly, Malherbe (’80, ’81, ’84) is not the only 500cc World Champion from that era to have passed. Sweden’s Carlqvist (’83), and fellow Belgians Georges Jobe (’87, ’91, ’92) and Eric Geboers (’88, ’90), also sadly passed at relatively young ages.
Godspeed, Andre Malherbe.
