The first weekend in June saw Phillip Island play host to round 2 of the MRRDA Junior National series. The MRRDA teams enthusiasm was renewed with Red Bull confirming their late inclusion in the series and one of, if not THE, best track in the world was beckoning. We knew we were in for a great weekend.

Seeing the Red Bull Arch up and having Red Bull product to keep us energised was certainly a very warm welcome back from Red Bull. Hartwell Motorcycle Club were co-hosting with a round of their state based series, so the weekends schedule was always going to be tight. Just to add to the mix Paul Edwards, founder and chairman of the MRRDA decided to pull his bike out of the shed and have a run in the Victorian Round of the Formula 400 State of Origin series which was also being run.

“It was not only good to get a run on the bike at arguably the best track in the world, but it was good for the MRRDA series competitors to see that I can actually ride too. I may have been about 5 seconds off my 2009 pace, having not raced for about a year, but it was enough for 2 top 10 finishes and great to be able to talk to the kids about the conditions at each corner. It's good to be able to score points for NSW as well!”

With the option to drop a round due to a clash with the Australian Superbike Series on in QLD the same weekend, a couple of the series regulars were missing. Notably Ollie Simpson, Corey Turner and Zac Zanesco. This left the door open for other riders to steal the top spot on the Red Bull podium.

The weekend started off slow due to a very misty Saturday morning, but once the sun found its way through the track dried quickly and the racing started in earnest. Towards the latter part of Saturday afternoon the weather took a turn for the worst with races being called off due to the conditions. Sunday was simply wet.

In the nippers class we have the youngest Simpson, Jordy, in a hot fight with the Street twins of Tayla and Jacob along with Scott Nicholson thrown in for good measure. The first race saw Jacob take the win from his sister, but after a crash in race 2, Jacob failed ot show his early form, leaving Tayla to clean up for 3 race wins out of 4. Jacob managing to get the better of Jordy in his other 2 finishes. He will feel though that he should have managed a second win when he took a huge lead on his sister in one of Sunday’s wet races, only for Tayla to track him down and overtake him on the last lap.

The Junior two stroke class started off as a Troy Guenther master class. He simply blitzed the field in the 2 dry Saturday races, breaking lap records with just about every lap. However he did not have it all his own way in the wet. The first race on the Sunday saw Troy take an early lead only for Max Croker to peg him back and take first place just before the finish line. Things may have not been going well with Troy’s bike however as the final race of the weekend saw Max cruise away while Troy literally limped his bike through the race desperately trying to score as many points as he could. In the end Max took out the weekend with Troy 2nd and Western Australian Nathan Smith 3rd.

With Ollie Simpson missing from the Junior 4 stroke grid, the weekend was wide open for the other riders to take advantage. 4 races saw 4 different winners with Luke Sells and WA’s Lachlan Weyrich taking the wins in the dry, while Mitch Simpson and Nick Limington took the wins in the wet. All races were close affairs with the win in each case being by hundredths of a second. It seems that Phillip Island and the Honda 150’s are guaranteed to give us close finishes. In the end Mitch Simpson took the top step of the Red Bull Podium for the weekend, with Nick Limington on the 2nd step and Luke Sells the 3rd.

With Last year’s Rookies Cup prize winner Matt Barton having a shocking weekend, young Ryan Ritchie managed to make a clean sweep with 4 wins out of 4 races in the 125GP class. Unfortunately for Matt, his bike woes from race 1 were made considerably worse when he was taken out going into MG corner in a support race, which resulted in him being taken to hospital. We’re pleased to report nothing broken, but it was the end of Matt’s weekend. Hot on Ryan’s heels was Callum Barker with James Carrison not far behind, until James too failed to finish the last race. So the end result was a top step for Ryan, with Callum and James on 2nd and 3rd.

The 250Gp Mono class started out well for Luke Sells who like Max Croker was doubling up with riding in the Junior classes. Luke won the first race in the dry, got 3rd in the second race, but failed to finish the final 2 wet races. Meanwhile although Kane Burns took his time to warm up, he certainly showed everyone how to ride in the wet with 3 superb wins and a fine demonstration of making sure that you get your breaking done before you tip in and keeping things super smooth in the wet. Tristan Harmer and Max Croker were never far of the pace, but in the end Kane took a well-deserved 1st for the weekend with Tristan 2nd and Max 3rd.

The 600 Superstock class saw Ben Currie and Kirby Dickinson again battle it out for top honours with Ben managing to make the most of both wet and dry conditions to make it a clean sweep of 4 wins from 4 races with Kirby managing a close 2nd in each case.

A great weekend, at a great circuit, along with some new faces on the top step, who will take the momentum into round 3 at Broadford at the end of June. This all adds up to a fascinating round 3 at a tight and twisty circuit. Bring on the end of June.

A big thank you to Steve Dugan of SDPICS.COM for his photos from the weekend. For more photos check out www.sdpics.com