Image: Jeremy Hammer (Foremost Media).

CDR Yamaha’s Dylan Long lodged a season-best result of fourth at Coolum’s 10th and final round of the Motul MX Nationals last weekend in Queensland, providing the youthful talent with a timely boost of confidence ahead of the 2017 Australian Supercross Championship.

Long, who injured his wrist during the off-season, has had a challenging recovery, with the injury hampering his nationals campaign throughout.

The popular Victorian explained the placing is where he feels he should be, stating something needed to happen after a series of modest finishes on the result sheets.

“It’s where I feel like I should be,” Long told MotoOnline.com.au. “It’s been a pretty tough year this year with the injury and comeback. I’ve done a bit of sand riding before [Coolum] trying not jar or hurt my wrist, the sand just seemed a lot easier on it.

“I’d just ride more sand, so I knew coming into that track that I should be able to go pretty good, and yeah, it sort of happened. Something needed to happen, I guess the last couple didn’t really go the way I planned.

“We had a plan to slowly build by the end of the season, and we did that. I should’ve had better results at Toowoomba, I feel my riding was a lot better than where I finished overall – if I had one more point, I would’ve finished in sixth.”

The number 117 is slated to make the switch to the highly-anticipated 2018 YZ450F for supercross, where he’s adamant on commencing in strong form.

“I haven’t had a chance to ride supercross yet,” he continued. “So I’m not too sure how the wrist will hold up. We’ll assess it and see how we go, but it shouldn’t be too bad. I do plan to come in pretty strong though, I do like supercross, I’ve been riding it since I was younger and I’m not too bad at it.

“The only downside is that I’ve haven’t done it in two years – I missed last year with injury, and the year before I only got two rounds in before I had an injury. It’s going to be good to get back at it and have a crack.”

Long completed the 2017 Motul MX Nationals 13th in the overall standings after missing a number of rounds. The Australian Supercross Championship is pencilled in to begin on 23 September, at Jimboomba in Queensland.