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Photo - Mark Burling and the ’82 XT200J with which he won his class at the New Zealand Four-stroke Motocross Championships at the weekend on a bike that was older than him:
Racing a Yamaha manufactured a year before he was even born, 21-year-old Mark Burling stunned the country's major motorcycle importers when he won his class at the New Zealand Four-stroke Motocross Championships at the weekend.
Eltham's Burling won the under-200cc class riding his father's 1982-model Yamaha XT200, a motorcycle not purpose-built for competition and actually much more at home rounding up sheep on the farm. Although Burling's Yamaha was, not unexpectedly, left gasping as the modern race machines ran away from him during Saturday's programme on the steep Te Awamutu track, it was a different story when rain arrived the next morning.
Burling had built a fine foundation for himself by finishing 3-3-2 on Saturday and, following two impressive wins in the mud on Sunday, the Taranaki man and his old metal-tanked XT200 rocketed through to take the title. Runner-up was Hamilton's Daniel Ratford, with New Plymouth's Stuart Baker third.
Burling's father John said all the other riders had a huge advantage in the dry and “Mark had to ride the wheels off the bike. But, when it rained, Mark just kept it smooth” as all around him struggled. “I think Honda put a huge effort in. Glenn McArtney was there with a new Honda CRF250 sleeved down to 200cc. It was a bit like having Michael Schumacher turn up with his F1 car at Bathurst.”
Consistency is what counted in the end and Burling's 22-year-old Yamaha ran like clockwork. “I took the bike back from Mark the next day and went out to round up the sheep,” he laughed.
Mark Burling had finished runner-up to national champion Cody Cooper at the same event last year.
