Pack chasing frontrunners hard

This season's New Zealand Motocross Championships have reached the halfway stage and likely winners have emphatically revealed themselves.

Tauranga's Ben Townley (MX1, 450cc class), Hamilton's Darryll King (MX2, 250cc) and Amberley's Micah McGoldrick (125cc and under-21) have the points advantage in their respective categories but they will each be keeping a nervous watch over their shoulders as the series heads to Harrisville, near Pukekohe, for the third round of four tomorrow.

They each know they can take nothing for granted with two rounds of racing still to come.

Former world champion Townley will be wary of the constant threat posed by long-time friend and rival Josh Coppins, the man from Motueka who has twice finished runner-up in the world championships. Defending MX1 champion Cody Cooper, of Mount Maunganui, is also starting to build momentum, as are Rotorua's Michael Phillips and Auckland's Hamish Dobbyn.

King snatched the lead in the MX2 class at round two last weekend but he'll feel the heat from round-one winner Scotty Columb on Sunday, the Queenstown rider determined to reclaim the No 1 spot in the title chase, while many-time former champion Daryl Hurley, of Hawera, continues to loiter with intent, in third place overall.

In the 125cc class, McGoldrick is coming under intense pressure from Bay of Plenty trio Cameron Vaughan (Rotorua), Logan Blackburn, (Tauranga), and Rotorua's's Cameron Negus, and he'll need to be at his best on Sunday to fend off the challengers.

These riders will also be well aware of the threat posed by riders flying just under the radar, Tauranga's Peter Broxholme, Mount Maunganui's Rhys Carter, Waitakere's Ethan Martens, Wellington's Jayden Jessup, Nelson's Nathan Clare, Auckland's Callan May and Te Awamutu's Ryan Thompson.

There will also be racing this weekend for the MX3 riders, a support class for non-qualifiers.

The circuit at Harrisville has recently undergone a major revamp with expatriate Kiwi Greg Atkins, who directs the motocross world championship organisers on track design in Europe, at home for a "holiday", spending hours with a bulldozer in recent weeks the Pukekohe turf.

After Pukekohe this weekend, the series heads to Taupo in a fortnight for a thrilling final-round climax.