NZ Insider No.16: Analysing Team NZ

Welcome to our brand new weekly web-exclusive column, Transmoto‘s NZ Insider. Penned each week by Kiwi, Chris Ritchie, the NZ Insider will present the story-behind-the-stories on NZ-related dirt bike happenings across the globe. 

With the MX Nationals now complete for 2014, as well as the AMA Nationals (which came to an end in Utah a fortnight ago), and the World MX GPs having one round remaining in Mexico this coming weekend, much of the focus of the global motocross fraternity now lies on Latvia and the prestigious Motocross of Nations event, to be held at the Kegums circuit just outside Riga over the final weekend in September, less than three weeks from now.

Unfortunately for New Zealand, we are unable to send our strongest team due to an evergrowing injury list. Team New Zealand from the 2013 MXoN in Germany are all out of action, and subsequently unavailable for MXoN selection for 2014.

Current National MX1 champ, Cody Cooper, has been sidelined with a knee injury sustained at the opening round of the Oz MX Nationals at Broadford back at the end of March after a stellar defence of his NZ MX1 crown. 2014 NZ MX2 champ, Kayne Lamont, continued his dominance from the NZ series through into the MX Nationals from the outset, then suffered a number of setbacks as the season progressed including a broken collarbone. His season was also over prematurely.

The third member of Team NZ from 2013, Rhys Carter, stepped up to the 450 full-time at Team Motul Suzuki alongside Matt Moss, and proved many doubters wrong cracking into the top five in the Pro Open class before unluckily breaking his wrist in a practice crash, taking him out of contention for a trip to Latvia.

This left Motorcycling New Zealand with a severe dilemma, with the decision to open applications up to riders interested in representing their country in 2014 in the Baltic. Here are the riders who have been selected to represent New Zealand.

Warkworth’s Hamish Dobbyn has had a rollercoaster 2014 season. After an impressive domestic MX2 series, he embarked on the MX Nationals, and suffered a serious head knock, forcing the KTM rider to take some time away from the sport. He came back with a vengeance late in the MX Nationals series, including taking an impressive moto win at Raymond Terrace. Dobbyn will step up to the 450 for the MX of Nations, competing in the MX1 class with #58.

Takaka’s Hamish Harwood finished an impressive 2014 season with second overall in Pro Lites after winning the MXD championship in 2013. He will switch from the 250 two-stroke to four-stroke and line up for Team NZ in MX2 in Latvia with #59 on his back. Both Hamish’s will be on factory KTM machinery in Latvia, supplied by German MX stalwart and KTM dealer, Bodo Schmidt.

Queenstown’s own Scott Columb, no stranger to international competition having competed at GP level during the mid to late 2000s, will relish in the opportunity to not only fly the NZ flag in Latvia, but also take the reigns as team captain for the auspicious event. Scott will ride the number #60 factory Rinaldi Yamaha YZ450F in MX3/Open.

I believe that this is by no means an understrength team, and feel that they can at least qualify in the top 20 nations, which takes the team into Sunday’s Main Event, and have what it takes to crack the top 10 in the world. We are all right in behind Team NZ!