Image: Jeff Crow.

Yamalube Yamaha Racing Team’s Mitch Evans has his sights set on making the move to becoming a fulltime professional racer in the near future as he prepares for his 2016 MXD Motul MX Nationals assault.

Whilst striving to further his motocross career, the championship favourite has made the decision to stay in school and complete his high school education as well as race a fulltime schedule on the weekends, a tough task for the young Queenslander.

“I would love to be able to just race fulltime and to be a professional racer is my goal,” said Evans. “But at the moment my parents and I believe it’s important to have a good education so I have other opportunities in life if the motocross career doesn’t work out.

“At the moment, I have to balance a few things to make it work and it can be tough when I’m away racing and have assignments due at the same time. Even leading into the first round, I have exams and a school camp in the week leading up to Horsham so I have to manage my time as best I can.”

Since joining the Yamalube Yamaha Racing Team in 2015, the factory-supported team has relived some pressure on the family and on Evans’ time as he is now able to fly to the races and spend more time focusing on training and studying.

“Working with everyone on the team has been awesome,” he explained. “With them taking care of the race bikes and travel, it allows me to fly to and from the races meaning I don’t miss as much school and I’m not always trying to catch up. So, I can focus on my riding and training and not waste time sitting in a car driving up and down the coast every other weekend.”

2016 will prove a pivotal year in Evans’ career as he hopes perform well enough to secure a fulltime ride in the MX2 category for 2017, if he is unable to do so the 17-year-old isn’t ruling out the option of heading off to university to further his education.

“I hope to be able to secure a full time ride with a MX2 team next year so I can focus on racing and see where it takes me,” he added. “You only have a small window to make a career out of racing and I would like to put 100 percent into that – I can always go back to university.”

Evans will begin his 2016 Motul MX Nationals MXD championship campaign on 3 April at Horsham in Victoria alongside teammate Jordan Hill.