“With [Tauranga’s] Brodie Connolly [now
injured and] out of the 125cc class, I can tone
it back a bit and just do what I need to do to
get the results. The pressure is off me a bit in
that class, although there are still some very
fast riders there,” said Harwood.
“In the MX2 class it didn’t quite go to plan for
me today. I was in the lead for a lot of the first
race, but then some lappers held me up and
(Australian) Kyle Webster went around the
outside of me. I ran out of time to pass him
and was only about a second behind him at
the finish.
“In race two I tucked the front wheel under
me in the first lap and crashed. I was back in
seventh or eighth and fought back to second
place and wasn’t far behind Wilson Todd in
the end.
“In race three, once again I crashed in about
the third corner of the first lap and then a
rider in front of me made a mistake and
crashed and I went into him, hitting the dirt for
a second time. I fought back to finish fourth.
“It wasn’t an ideal weekend for me, but I had
good speed ... I could have won, should have
won ... but things just didn’t work out for me.
I’m still leading the series in the MX2 class and
I have to be happy with that. It could have
been worse.”
Mangakino’s Maximus Purvis continued
to lead the MX2 class battle-within-a-battle
for Under-19 age group honours and, after
Rotorua, he was eight points ahead of
Australian Morgan Fogarty, with Hamilton’s
Reef Wheki still third.
HARWOOD
KIWI RIDER 85