Jay's MX Nationals Championship defence is on target so far

Welcome to my first blog on MotoOnline.com.au, where I’ll keep you guys updated on my season in the MX Nationals and Super X this year, checking in when I get a chance and keeping you all up to date with how things are going.

The last couple of weeks have been pretty busy with racing in North Queensland at Toowoomba and Mackay, which were the third and fourth rounds of the 2009 outdoor motocross series.

The weekend at Toowoomba went awesome. I knew that Andrew McFarlane was going to be on his game at that track and he wasn’t the quickest rider on the track in qualifying but he was definitely quick. He took off in the first moto and I got held up a bit, so we were five seconds apart and I couldn’t catch him – it pretty much stayed like that for the whole race playing cat and mouse with each other.

I knew in the second race that I had to do the same thing to him. I didn’t get the best start but I came through and overtook him quickly on the first lap and pulled a gap, and then he wasn’t able to catch me.

It was one of those races where if any of us made a mistake then the other guy would have taken advantage unless you had a perfect 30 minutes of racing.

The round paid off and he didn’t catch me in the points at all in what I thought would be one of his strongest rounds, so it was good to walk away with the win and also to retain the lead in the championship.

And then for the following weekend we raced at Mackay and it was a tough round for me because I was really sick before it, just really run down and my daughter Lila had been in hospital, so it was a pretty hard weekend. I didn’t get much riding in before it, but the actual race went really good for me and for the CDR Rockstar Yamaha team.

My teammate Cheyne Boyd was riding really good and he qualified first and he was just able to gap me at the beginning in both motos, but I was able to pull him in towards the end in both motos – just running out of time in the races so I had to take second for the weekend.

I think if I was on my game a little bit more then I wouldn’t have let him go at the start and I would have given him more of a battle at the end, but that’s the way things go sometimes. Overall the round was good and we scored more points, but it was good to get home to my fiancé Abby and my baby Lila, for sure.

Looking at the series I think that so far it’s been awesome that we’ve fit as many races in as what we have, and it was good to give the rookies who came into the Open class a bit of a crack with the sprint race formats at the start of the season, which are more like what a lot of the younger kids are used to after coming out of juniors.

The 30 minute races more come down to experience and strength, so looking back when we had the 15 or 20 minute races at the start I think it’s been equally good for everybody in the field – even for the privateer guys who usually go good for the first ten minutes and then struggle for the last half of the races.

There are a few guys who will start shining and coming on strong at this time in the championship, so I’m looking forward to the next few rounds to wrap it up. Boydy always gets stronger late in the season and McFarlane is an old dog, he’s been there many times before and knows what it takes.

I just need to be strong and I think these next two races in South Australia and Western Australia are going to be important, so I’m going to go over the Perth to get some practice in the sand for the Wanneroo round before the round in SA, and then after that I’ll fly straight back to Perth again.

When I’m on the road like that I will keep training and the riding in the thick sand requires a lot of fitness because the endurance that you need is that much harder when you’re throwing the 450 around over the big whoops in the sand, so it will be good to get some time in over there before we have to race.

It should be a good couple of rounds coming up so I’ll check back in with you guys then and keep you posted with my results and how it’s all looking for me as the season winds down.

Jay