Motorsport: King rules the dirt at Taupo

Hamilton's Darryll King has No1 on the front and sides of his Yamaha for a reason.

Rivals were left in no doubt about why the No1 is so prominently displayed on his YZ250 two-stroke, showing he's a long way from ready to give it up as he blasted to victory in the MX2 class on the sandy Digger McEwen circuit at the big annual Taupo Motocross Extravaganza over Labour Weekend.

He raced to three convincing wins in the veterans' class - probably not unexpected since the 43-year-old is, after all, the 2012 veterans' world champion - but then he backed that up by winning the MX2 class as well.

And perhaps that was no surprise either, since, for the past two seasons he has been the national MX2 champion.

But things nearly came unstuck for King when he inadvertently jumped while an "accident" yellow flag was being shown ... he was relegated one place, from first to second in the race.

But it didn't affect the ultimate outcome for King because he responded by winning the next races anyway - then wrapped up the day by finishing third while racing against the 450cc bike riders in the all-capacities champion-of-champions feature final.

This was easily enough to give him the MX2 title overall.

"The flag thing just happened so fast. I had committed to the jump before I'd seen the flag," King said.

"I came here really underprepared this weekend. But to come here and dominate is a very positive outcome.

"I enjoy racing the veterans' class, where I came up against my old mate Darren Capill. We've raced each other for years and it's always fun," he said.

Whakatane's Capill (Yamaha YZ450F) finished runner-up to King in all three veterans' races.

"I feel I'm getting faster each year," said King. "My aim now is to race just one more season and to make it a three-peat of consecutive MX2 titles, to go out with a bang."

The New Zealand Motocross Championships kick off just outside Timaru on February 10 next year, then head to Patetonga for round two a fortnight later (February 24), with round three at Pukekohe on March 10 and the fourth and final round set for Taupo on March 31.