Image: Foremost Media.

Highly-rated New Zealander Brodie Connolly has outlined supercross as ‘the main goal’ moving forward, linked to a future with Fire Power Honda in the US.

Connolly, 19, secured a coveted seat at Honda Racing this year after impressing team owner Yarrive Konsky while representing NZ at the Motocross of Nations (MXoN) last year.

The Kiwi delivered an impressive first MX2 campaign in Penrite ProMX, scoring round podiums at Appin and Queensland Moto Park, plus the overall victory at Wodonga. He completed the 2023 season with a 3-6 scorecard at Coolum to secure third in the championship in what was essentially his rookie campaign in the class.

The attention of the CRF250R rider now turns to supercross, travelling this week to prepare at the Millsaps Training Facility (MTF) ahead of the 2023 Australian Supercross Championship (AUSX) that commences on 7 October in Adelaide.

Once the domestic season has concluded, it is expected that Connolly will be transferring to Konsky’s Fire Power Honda team for 2024 as part of a supercross-only program.

“Supercross is the main goal for me – I would love to be racing it,” Connolly said to MotoOnline. “AMA is definitely the end goal for me and I am excited to get stuck into some supercross these coming months. “I’ll fly to MTF on Tuesday and start preparing with the boys over there and, yeah, I’m really looking forward to that.

“When I had first signed with Yarrive he had said about how he has got that team in America, that it would be the end goal for me with him. I knew that from the start, but I was happy to do a year here first because I have still got a lot to learn and I reckon I did learn a massive amount this year.”

Connolly’s journey has been one of rapid progress, completing the first two rounds of the Australian motocross season last year at WBR Yamaha as a fill-in, improving inside the top 10 on both occasions.

While he won’t represent Team New Zealand at the Motocross of Nations in 2023, he impressed at the event last year before competing in the final round of the Japanese Motocross Championship in the IA2 (250cc) class. Connolly was ultimately victorious in Sugo, ending Jay Wilson’s (Yamaha Factory Racing) winning streak with a 2-1 scorecard before making the switch to Honda Racing.

“Young Brodie, what a revelation,” Honda racing team owner Konsky added. “Like I said, I saw him last year and I was super-excited by him. I felt like he was someone that would fit in with our team, and do extremely well and he has done just that.

“We are working closely with him on next year, and I feel he shouldn’t be here. I feel that in his rookie season, he has excelled and shown phenomenal talent, the talent that we saw he had. For that reason, I think that he should be overseas and I’m willing to invest in that.

“We are just working through that at the moment, obviously he has very limited supercross experience, it’s not really a championship that is raced in New Zealand, but I think with his technical skill he will pick it up quite quickly. We are working towards that – his season has been just superb.”