Taupo Extravaganza - comments and results.
24 Oct: A day in the sun at Taupo. Big news was Cody Cooper (Team Suzuki) winning over Ben Townley (Kawasaki) - I was told, "fair and square."
MX1
- No, I was not there as on Targa Rally Media duties but have had conversations with those that were.
- Event sponsored by Huka Honda.
- Tom Hughes stepped up to MX1 and was 11th fastest in Practice.
- Race 1 and Cody Cooper led for 6 laps.
- Ben Townley was through at Lap 7 but was only .970 in front at the flag.
- It was 47 seconds back to Shaun Fogarty who had come through from 7th at Lap 1. 18 secs to Damien King, 7 secs to Hayden Clark and 20 secs to Mitch Rees.
- Race 2 and it was Cooper, Townley, Clark from Lap 1 to the finish. Coops won it by just 0.4 seconds.
- A whopping 51 back to Clark and 27 to Fogarty and 31 to King.
- Race 3 was the Nicky Smith Memorial where the top 12 from each MX1, MX2 and National 125cc / Under 21s participate and I will cover it separately even though you can see the points below.
- Results are courtesy of Nicole Bol from MX Timing.
| Pos |
No. |
Name |
Total points |
R1 |
R2 |
R3 |
| 1 |
2 |
Cody Cooper |
72 |
22 |
25 |
25 |
| 2 |
101 |
Ben Townley |
69 |
25 |
22 |
22 |
| 3 |
5 |
Shaun Fogarty |
52 |
20 |
18 |
14 |
| 4 |
310 |
Hayden Clark |
52 |
16 |
20 |
16 |
| 5 |
18 |
Damien King |
47 |
18 |
16 |
13 |
| 6 |
155 |
Scott Moir |
35 |
14 |
15 |
6 |
| 7 |
10 |
Shannon Hewetson |
32 |
13 |
14 |
5 |
| 8 |
933 |
Jesse Donnelly |
24 |
11 |
13 |
-- |
| 9 |
6 |
Grant Van der Drift |
24.055 |
12 |
12 |
0.055 |
| 10 |
110 |
Barry Morris |
21 |
10 |
11 |
-- |
MX2
- Timed Practice was an indicator of what was to come and there was Darryll King still 4th fastest - still the benchmark.
- Race 1 and Luke Burkhart, now on KTM, led from start to finish.
- Kayne Lamont held 2nd until Lap 8 when DK was through.
- John Phillips was in 3rd until Lap 5 when he was picked off by DK and then in the last lap by Peter Broxholme.
- Into Lap 4 and Henry Madams, who was in 7th, crashed with Cam Dillon who had come through from 11th at Lap 1.
- Madams restarted in 31st then dropped out. Dillon restarted in 24th and toiled away to finish 13th. Madams day was done.
- Tracking Brad Groombridge's laps made interesting reading. At Lap 1 he was 27th, at Lap 2 he was 17th. A lap later he was 9th and stayed there until the last lap where he picked up another place.
- Race 2 and Groombridge led from start to finish from Dillon, winning by 4.2 secs.
- Burkhart was in 3rd until Lap 6 when he started to drop down lap by lap to finish 6th.
- Dillon had the fastest lap by 1 second.
- DK was 3rd, Phillips 4th, Lamont 5th.
- Again, Race 3 was the Nicky Smith Memorial and I will cover it separately.
- Good to see Lamont on the podium after his European stint.
| Pos |
No. |
Name |
Total points |
R1 |
R2 |
R3 |
| 1 |
701 |
Brad Groombridge |
60 |
15 |
25 |
20 |
| 2 |
10 |
Darryl King |
60 |
22 |
20 |
18 |
| 3 |
6 |
Kayne Lamont |
48 |
20 |
16 |
12 |
| 4 |
210 |
John Phillips |
41 |
14 |
18 |
9 |
| 5 |
4 |
Nick Saunders |
41 |
16 |
14 |
11 |
| 6 |
99 |
Luke Burkhart |
40 |
25 |
15 |
-- |
| 7 |
808 |
Jayden Jessup |
40 |
12 |
13 |
15 |
| 8 |
555 |
Cam Dillon |
30 |
8 |
22 |
0 |
| 9 |
75 |
Joshua Jack |
30 |
11 |
12 |
7 |
| 10 |
3 |
Peter Broxholme |
28 |
18 |
-- |
10 |
I WILL POST NATIONAL 125, VETS, SUPPORT AND THE NICKY SMITH MEMORIAL WHEN TIME ALLOWS.
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