Wainuiomata’s Jake Whitaker was untouchable at rounds five and six of the North Island Moto Trials Championships in the Waikato at the weekend.

The conditions were atrocious but the national champion coped best, winning both days in the Experts grade.

“On Saturday the weather held off but the ground was still fairly slippery with all the rain earlier in the week which made a couple of sections interesting which was good in a way as most of the sections were on the easy side.

“I finished the day off with another good lead ahead of second place with a 13 points lost for the day.

“After Listening to the amount of rain coming down through the night, it was hard to be enthusiastic about getting out there Sunday morning. We got out there in the end to see that the organisers were setting all new sections along the side of the river as the river had risen so much over night that we couldn’t cross it.

“I went out for a warm up and it was clear it was going to be an extremely slippery and muddy day. I started the day off great, finding plenty of traction in all the mud but had a unlucky ‘five’ on one of the sections towards the end of my first lap which I wasn’t happy about as it was such a low scoring trial that it makes it tough to come back from that.

“After a disappointing first lap of eight points, I improved on my second to only drop two.

“Due to the conditions, the organisers decided to drop a lap to only make it a three-lap trial. On my final lap I was riding my best I had done all day and didn’t make any mistakes which was good because the sections defiantly got harder as the day went on.

Whitaker’s next big assignment is in Australia in the first week of August for the third round of the NSW championships.

“I will be training hard for that,” he said. “My new bike has arrived over the weekend so I am looking forward to ripping it out of the box.

“A big thanks to my minder, Nick, for all his efforts over the weekend, John Lawton at Beta for helping out with, what I can only call an awesome bike.”

Whitaker is sponsored by Hutt Boyz Choppers, Vee Rubber tyres, Spectro Oils, Pro Grip GP Gel, DID chains, Crown Kiwi Enterprises, Kapiti Beta and Kaos Trials.

© Photo by Andy McGechan, www.BikesportNZ.com