WELLINGTON-BOUND | Bikesportnz

If it’s true there is no rest for the wicked; then New Zealand’s elite off-road bike racers must be very bad men indeed.

The mud has perhaps only just been washed from the motorcycles following round one of the KTM New Zealand Enduro Championships near Whangamata and now round two is already looming large for the nation’s leading off-road exponents, with the competitors this week making their way south to tackle the steep forest course at Pauatahanui, near Porirua, this Saturday.

Glen Eden’s Chris Birch, the defending national champion, won the series opener at a muddy Whangamata just over a week ago, with fellow Aucklander Liam Draper and Kaikohe’s Mitchell Nield joining him on the podium.

Auckland’s Chris Power, Feilding’s Freddie Milford-Cottam (pictured here) and Taupo teenager Greg De Lautour rounded out the top six finishers at Whangamata, while Wainuiomata’s seven-time former and the current national moto trials champion Jake Whitaker was never far behind in seventh spot overall.

All of these men will have their sights zeroed in on Birch, each of them hoping they can halt another win-streak by the Kiwi international before it can get started.

Birch won all six rounds of the national championship series last season and the last thing any of these riders want is for Birch to start building up momentum for another unbeaten run in 2014.

Racing in the Akatarawa, Puketiro and Fernhill Forests kicks off at the Moonshine motocross track, on Bulls Run Road, off Moonshine Road, near Pauatahanui, at about 10am.

Following Saturday’s event, the series heads to the Riverhead Forest, near Auckland, for round three on March 23, followed by round four near Christchurch on April 5, round five at Oparau on April 19 and, finally, it all wraps up at Waimiha, in the King Country, on May 10.

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