RAGLAN ROCX 4 HOUR

The first round of the Raglan motorcycle club's Raglan Rocx 4 hour 2 man cross country race was held on the 23rd of January on Ohautria rd near Te Uku, with an invite to ride with Cam Downing on his little Kawasaki KX125 for the Metalman KMP X Country team. I was all too keen to get back on a little 125 again, I still think they are the most fun bike to ride out of anything you can buy.  On the Wednesday night before the race I shot up to Kimmy's Moto X Park near Huntly to have a ride on the bike so I'd have a feeling of it before race day.  It went well, but was very different compared with my 450, but of course that’s why I needed to ride it first.  I came to grips with the bike pretty quickly and was happy with the set up.  Life was made pretty easy for me leading up to the race and for the first time since I started racing I didn’t have to prep my bike before a race!! 

Come race day, all I had to do was milk in the morning and head out to the race.  I always think Im going to be late when I have to milk first but I got out there with plenty of time to spare.  With a 26 km track, a little extra on the first lap and word that it was going to be long lap times we didn’t know how often to pit for gas, but I was hoping to do laps.  Cam did the start and I don’t even know how that went for him, it was a coupe of km’s away so I couldn’t see much.   It was decided by the team to pull Cam in after the first lap to fuel up and send me out.  I headed out and rode pretty well I thought, I managed to pass a few guys in that lap.  I was having a good time out there on the 125 too.  Coming into the lap scorers at the end of my first lap I got a pit board from Cam's sister saying we were running 17th and to keep going, so with out stopping a headed out for my second lap.  I didn’t pass too many people in that lap and no one had passed me until just before the end of the lap Dean Goodwright shot past me after he had some bad luck on the first couple of laps.  I gave he bike back to Cam for him to do 2 laps while I put my feet up and had a feed and waited till it was my turn again.  By the time I got back on the bike we knew I would only have to do my 2 laps to finish the race and with a pretty good lead in the 0-200cc 2 stroke class and running 13th outright (although changing due to people pitting at different times) I set out to try and crack the top 10, something I've never done before.  I was riding really well and even having the odd scary moment because I was pushing so hard. It caught up to me in the end when I slipped over while standing up round a fast down hill left hander, I slid for a bit but the bike just kept going and ended up over the bank. Lucky for me it was right there, if it had gone further I think it may have been game over for us.  Coming back to how much I love 125's, it was so light that I just grabbed it and lifted it straight back up again so the whole crash probably only cost me a minute or so.  After that I was thinking I should probably worry more about keeping our class win hope's alive as apposed to going hell for leather and trying for a better outright result.   Towards the end of the lap I came across Dean parked up on the side of the track, I gave him the thumbs up to check that he was alright and he pointed at his bike, turns out he'd run out of gas.  As I came into the lap scorers again I got the go ahead to keep going and in which would be the last lap.  I rode pretty smooth but didn’t back off too much because I didn’t know how far or how close the 2nd place 0-200cc 2 stroke team of Andrew Gaddes and Graeme Goodwright were, if these guys beat me I would never hear the end of it at the pub!!!    Just over half way around the last lap I came across my mate Stefan parked up on the side on the track who was having the race of his life teaming up with a super fast young fella called Sam Brown, running as high as 5th outright, these two were on it.  I stopped to ask him if he was alright and he had just crashed and couldn’t start the bike. Thinking back now I should’ve started it for him but at the time I was more worried about losing the class win that I've never had before.  I'd been chasing a guy on a KTM that I could see in the distance well before I stopped to see if Stefan was alright and when I got going again I thought I had blown it and that he would’ve got away.  But I still knew he wouldn’t be that far away so I started pushing again, it wasn’t long after that I saw him again and as soon as I saw him I got straight on to his back tyre, I just couldn’t seem to get past him though.  I hate it when people catch me up right at the end of a race like that because I always seem to make a mistake, so I went with the idea that if I follow his close enough he'll bugger something up and he did just that on a steep down hilll left hand switch back, he just missed the rut so I dived in and got him.  After that it was just a few creek crossings and up to the finish.  We ended up coming home in 11th outright and we won the 0-200 2 stroke class by a few minutes, I just have to say a big thanks to Cam and his family for helping us out at the race and of course the Metalman KMP X country team for all their help. 

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