Brothers battle the bulldust at the Condo 750

Peter Whitaker

Whatever marginal benefits the ‘home ground’ might provide, the Smith siblings took advantage of the dry, dusty conditions to quinella the Slattery Auctions 2013 Condo 750 with Jake’s – Glenn Hoffman prepared – Honda CRF450X edging out Todd’s identical mount by over 3 minutes on the Saturday leg of what has become a 900km plus two-day sprint. Todd hit back on the Sunday, however picking up but a single second over almost four hours racing demonstrates just how competitive these blokes are.

After a 16-hour drive south from Longreach with a matched set of Yamaha WR450Fs for himself and Vern Strange – who flew in from West Australia – Rod Faggotter was rewarded with third spot on the podium with Vern taking seventh. Rod actually won Sunday’s leg by almost a minute but, after becoming geographically challenged on Saturday afternoon and spending six minutes doing donuts in the dust, lost too much time to threaten for a win.

In the absence of Ben Grabham it was up to Matt Fish to represent the orange corner on the CPW prepped KTM 450 SX-F, however he too ‘got off the nav’ and lost any chance of mounting a challenge. Talented local lads Dave Geeves and Luke Buckland took it down to the wire for fifth and sixth with Mildura’s Chad Vernon just in front of the best of the Quads – Ryan Hall’s Honda TRX – after which one may just as well stay at home pouring buckets of sand over your head and save for an engine rebuild.

However, thanks to the many landholders of Lachlan Shire the Condo committee organised another great event that was spawned by the Australian Safari back in 1988 and held almost every year since, with names such as Steve Riley, Mike Goddard, Paul Sinderberry and Jamie Cunningham on the Honour Roll. As such the Condo 750 attracts an eclectic group of riders and machinery such as John Hudson on a Kato 990 Adventure who gave away about 100kgs to the lighter machines, rookie Steve Sherwood on a Kato 350 who gave away 100cc to the H2 class, Max and Sam Hutchesson on a KTM 625 sidecar (a very brave pair of lads), and Garry Connell/Michael Heuchan all the way from WA, in a Polaris UTV.

For full results, check out the official Condo 750 website.

Moto Overall Results

1. Jake Smith
2. Todd Smith
3. Rod Faggotter
4. Matt Fish
5. David Geeves
6. Luke Buckland
7. Vernon Strange
8. Chad Vernon
9. Bradley Deeves
10. Grant Quave