One of Australia’s biggest races took place over the weekend in the Top End, being the Tatts Finke Desert Race. Starting at Alice Springs and then going a couple of hundred kays to Finke and back over two days, it’s an event that has gone from strength to strength in recent years.

This year was an all-Toby Price affair, as the HSE Motorex KTM Off Road Racing rider topped the Prologue, led the field out to Finke and then extended his lead on the way home for the outright win.

As the 2010 winner and with archrival Ben Grabham sidelined through injury, Price was always the favourite to win in 2012. However, anything can happen out in the desert, as was proven 12 months ago when Price’s factory SX-F suffered race-ending technical problems.

This year was smooth sailing for him however, winning by a margin that was approaching 10 minutes and delivering KTM exactly what they’d been looking for. In fact, this is probably KTM’s most important single event on the national calendar that they participate in.

Toby Price on his way to victory at Finke on Monday. Image: 404Shots.

The team heads out to Finke for pre-running a couple of times a year and around 30 people are on deck at the event to ensure it all runs to plan. KTM Australia GM Jeff Leisk loves this race, so no doubt the victory each and every year is a sweet one for him and the entire Austrian manufacturer.

What we did see this year was a great performance by local standout David Walsh, who was consistently second best amongst a host of the nation’s best talent. Riding a Honda CRF450R, Walsh rode to a well-deserved second and he was stoked with that.

Todd Smith’s podium made it two Hondas on the podium, which was another solid performance. Fresh from another win at the Condo 750 and as the defending Australasian Safari winner, Smith’s result adds to what has been a very rewarding 12 months.

Price’s guest teammate at Finke, Matthew Fish, impressed the KTM crew with fourth. He may have missed out on the podium, but team manager and second teammate Brad Williscroft said afterward that Fish exceeded expectations.

Jarrod Bewley rode through the pain to cement a top five for Yamaha.

After all, the team was originally supposed to have Grabbo and current Australian Off-Road Champion Chris Hollis, but the latter opted to focus on his AORC season following the first week of pre-running earlier this season. Needlesss to say, Fish proved a very worthy guest!

Yamaha had last year’s runner-up Jarrod Bewley in their corner this year and he finished fifth, despite a shoulder injury sustained in the lead-up to the event. It wasn’t an ideal race for Bewley, but he braved the pain and made it happen when it counted for a strong top five.

Yamaha had national motorsport manager Ray Howard on hand to oversee the action, and the brand new Active8 Yamaha Yamalube Racing team put forward a promising effort on debut with Bewley and team manager AJ Roberts.

The next big race on the schedule will be the Hattah Desert Race on 6-7 July, marking another vital event on the calendar for the factory teams that support desert racing on a domestic level. It’ll be interesting to see if Price can defend his title there and make it a Finke/Hattah sweep for 2012!