Bochum has a heart of steel. Bochum is the city “where the heart still matters,” as its famous son, Herbert Grönemeyer, describes his hometown in the heart of the Ruhr region. Where steel and coal have made history and “Herbie” rose to fame as a cult singer, “Spider” Martin Vugrinec now calls home. The 21-year-old IDM Supersport 600 rider from the UNIOR Racing Team moved from Croatia to the heart of the Ruhr region to pursue his racing career.
In Eastern Europe, Vugrinec—known as “Spider” Martin—has achieved just about everything in his class, winning the Alpe Adria Cup as well as the domestic 600cc championship. In 2018, the Yamaha YZF-R6 rider made his debut in the IDM, but remained somewhat reserved.
It was a completely different story in 2019: he secured six podium finishes and finished in the points in every race. Apart from him, only Marc Buchner and Wayne Tessels managed to do the same.
The reward: third place in the overall standings at the end of the year. Vugrinec’s goal: to become world champion someday. But first, he needs to win his first IDM race. That’s the one thing still missing. Although the competition is tougher than it’s been in a long time, Vugrinec is one of the riders with the best shot at winning.
The IDM is a major milestone in Vugrinec’s career, and there’s a good reason why he moved to Germany, as the professional athlete explains: “I’ve been living in Bochum for just over a year. In Croatia, there aren’t enough financial resources and there’s too little interest in motorsports. To achieve my goal of becoming world champion, we had to move somewhere else. Since we have some good friends and teammates who live in North Rhine-Westphalia, we moved here and plan to stay for a while.”
Just like for all the other teams, preparations for the 2020 IDM Supersport 600 season were thrown into disarray for the UNIOR Racing Team’s rising star. The training session in Spain scheduled for March was canceled after just one day. The team had to leave the Valencia racetrack due to the spreading coronavirus pandemic.
“We had hoped that everything would be over in a few days,” Vugrinec continues, “so we decided to wait at a friend’s beach house just south of Barcelona until the situation improved. After ten days, however, the situation worsened even further, and we returned to Bochum.” There, Vugrinec was still able to lean into the turns on a pit bike. Most of the time, though, he had to work on his physical conditioning in his own home gym.
Things have been going really well again since May. Vugrinec has been a frequent sight at his home track in Grobnik. “Right after that, I took part in a Croatian Championship event in Rijeka. That wasn’t actually the plan, but since I was already there, I decided to go for it and won both 600cc races.”
Before the first round of the IDM kicks off in Assen from August 14 to 18, 2020, the Croatian rider will also get to know the Sachsenring, where the second IDM event will be held. He is ready for whatever comes next.