Richard Pex arrived in the 2026 Belgian Rally Championship with a simple ambition: enjoy himself, keep learning and race hard. He left it as the BRC Masters champion, adding his name to a trophy that had spent the previous two years with his close friend, Jos Verstappen.
“De beker gaat terug mee naar Limburg,” Pex joked to RallyandRaces after sealing the title — the cup was returning to Limburg, and staying there for another year.
A Masters champion
Pex secured the 2026 BRC Master Cup with a second-place finish in the Masters class at the A&D Omloop van Vlaanderen, driving his Skoda Fabia RS Rally2 to sixth overall. The result was enough to make the championship mathematically safe.
It was a fitting outcome for a season built on consistency and pace. Pex had already taken two Masters Cup victories during the year, including a composed win at the Ardeca Ypres Rally in extremely hot conditions, and also scored maximum Masters points at the East Belgian Rally.
The title also carried a friendly edge. Verstappen had won the previous two Masters championships, and Pex’s success meant the trophy remained within their shared Limburg circle.
Why Belgium matters
Although Pex is Dutch, Belgian rallying has become central to his competitive life. He explained that he was drawn to the championship because of its difficulty, variety and the speed at which it forces a driver to develop.
“I like Belgium,” he said. “It’s not so easy to do Belgian driving, but you learn a lot and every rally I go better and better and better. That’s the reason that I start in Belgium.”
Pex noted that he had been racing in Belgium for four or five years, having begun just 10 kilometres from the border. For him, the appeal lies in the fact that no two events feel alike.
“Every rally has its own character,” he said. “Maloney has a lot of speed and Ypres is not so easy, with cutting the corners and a lot of mud on the road.”
That willingness to embrace demanding, unfamiliar conditions has become a defining part of his later career. Rather than treating rallying as a nostalgic hobby, Pex has approached it as a serious competitive challenge — one where experience, car control and trust in a co-driver still decide results.
Friendship, speed and fun
Pex’s relationship with Jos Verstappen stretches well beyond the Masters Cup. The two worked together in karting years ago, and now find themselves working together in rallying — albeit with rather different priorities than in their younger days.
“Before, we worked together in go-karting and now we work together in rally, and now it’s for fun,” Pex said.
That friendship is practical as well as personal. Pex described a relationship in which both men can ask each other questions, share experience and help one another improve.
“We are very good friends,” he said. “When I have a question, I can ask him, and when he has a question, he can ask me. We work a lot together.”
But Pex is equally clear that enjoyment is the reason he keeps returning to the stages. He spoke warmly about the time spent with his co-driver, the speed, the inevitable mistakes and the shared laughter after a stage.
“For me, the most important thing is that I have a lot of fun together with my co-pilot,” he said. “We sit all day in the car, and when we come out of the stage, we have a lot of fun. We have a moment, we have a lot of speed, we make a mistake — and that makes the fun in rally.”
There is rivalry, of course. Pex singled out fellow Masters competitor and experienced team owner Franky Boulat as someone he enjoys competing against, while also valuing the advice and experience available within the Belgian rally community.
“I have a competition with Franky Boulat,” Pex said. “He’s a good team owner and he has a lot of experience in rally, and I can ask him some things.”
The man who put Max in a kart
One of the most remarkable parts of Richard Pex’s story is that his connection to the Verstappen family began long before Max became a Formula 1 world champion. Pex, a friend of Jos Verstappen from the karting world, was the person who first placed a five-year-old Max in a kart at the family’s Maasbracht base.
“Max was five and did not like that Stan, my youngest son, was already driving a kart while he had to wait,” Pex recalled to Verstappen.com. “So I put Max in a little kart. He liked it. The rest is history.”
Jos Verstappen has since joked that it was Pex’s fault that Max started karting at all. But Pex quickly recognised that Max had something unusual: the combination of natural speed, determination and competitive instinct that would later carry him to the top of world motorsport.
Pex’s support became more substantial as Max’s career developed. He sponsored Max from 2015, while the Pex and Verstappen families travelled together to Italian karting circuits, widely regarded as the heartland of international karting, with Max and Pex’s three sons, Yard, Jorrit and Stan.
That period created more than a racing programme. It created a close family friendship that has endured into rallying, with Pex and Jos now sharing stages in the Belgian Rally Championship and their sons remaining close friends.
Business success behind the driver
Pex’s motorsport career is built on a successful business foundation. He took over his father’s roofing company near Echt and, over roughly 40 years, developed it into a substantial enterprise.
That background matters because it explains the practical, self-reliant way Pex approaches racing. In karting, he and Jos Verstappen did much of the work themselves — preparing karts, tuning engines and building the expertise needed to compete at a high level. Pex’s company also provided the workshop environment and test-bench facilities that became part of the Verstappen family’s karting operation.
His business career gave him more than financial backing. It gave him the operational discipline to run a serious sporting programme: managing equipment, travel, technical development and a full rally calendar while continuing to work. That same approach is visible in his rally career, where he has moved quickly from newcomer to BRC Masters champion.
Pex has also been linked with wider property and logistics interests, including PEX Real Estate, but the clearest and best-documented business story remains the family roofing company he expanded over four decades.
A late bloomer — with serious intent
Pex describes himself as a latecomer to motorsport in some respects: he only began karting himself at 35, yet went on to win three national titles and become a successful karter. His sons followed him into the sport, with Jorrit becoming a multiple karting world champion.
That experience shaped his approach to rallying. When Jos suggested hiring a rally car after a Porsche track day, Pex was immediately hooked.
“When you step into such a car and press the throttle, something happens,” he said to Start84.nl. “Also with yourself. We were sold immediately.”
Within only a few seasons, Pex had become a credible front-runner in Belgian rallying. ,His 2026 Masters title confirmed that this is not simply a hobby funded by business success it is a sporting project pursued with the same commitment that built his company.
What the title means
Pex’s 2026 championship is not the story of a former racer briefly returning to the paddock. It is the story of someone who has made Belgian rallying part of his life, developed into a genuine contender and done it while keeping friendship and enjoyment at the centre of the experience.
He came into the season aiming to build on a strong 2025, when he finished second in the BRC Masters championship. Twelve months later, he had gone one better.
And as he made clear, the title matters — but so does the reason he is out there at all.
“It’s better we make some rallies than we go at home and do nothing,” Pex said. “We make a lot of fun together.”
The RacerViews info –
By Sam Tickell
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