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APRIL 26, 2007: Motorcycling is a real family affair for the Alabasters of Raetihi.
The head of the household is 45-year-old Alfred (Alf) Alabaster, a regular competitor in national championship level cross-country, enduro and motocross events -- riding all events on the same bike no less, a two-stroke Yamaha YZ250.
More often than not he shares space in the pits with three of his five children -- Letitia (18), Alfred junior (16) and Charles (14) -- and they also ride Yamahas, but the YZF250 four-stroke variety.
Letitia works in the family's service station, saving up before she goes off to university, while Alfred junior and Charles are students at Wanganui High School.
The two other Alabaster children, Kathryn (12) and Daniel (10), do not ride dirt bikes but it's probably only a matter of time before they do.
“I think Daniel prefers skiing at the moment but he has expressed an interest in dirt bikes, so time will tell if he one day comes bike riding with his brothers and sister and me,” said Alf senior.
As for wife and mum Debbie, she rules out ever getting on a bike.
“Hell no,” she says. “I'm just there to pick up the pieces and pay the bills,” she laughs.
But the dirt-biking half of this family more than makes up for the others when it comes to chasing accolades on the motorcycle race track.
Letitia finished fourth in the women's class at the weekend's New Zealand Four-stroke Motocross Championships in the King Country, while Alfred junior was placed 13th in the hotly-contested junior 14-16 years 250cc class (the class won by Yamaha’s Luke Temple, of Ngatea).
“Leititia prefers motocross to cross-country and enduro because she's small and light and three-hour races can be a bit tough on her,” said Alf senior.
“As a family, we only got involved in racing dirt bike about five years ago, when I was about 40. Now we are heading off somewhere nearly every weekend to race our bikes.
“We run a 600 acre sheep and beef farm and a Caltex service station too ... we got a couple of two-wheelers for the kids to ride on the farm and it just grew from there.
“The blokes at Paragon Yamaha in Wanganui looked after me so well that we've gone back to them several times. Even though I'm just a Joe Bloggs racer, nothing has ever been too much trouble for them.”
But so much for being a “Joe Bloggs racer”. Alf senior managed to finish sixth overall in the veteran’s class of the just-completed North Island Cross Country Championships (the class won by Yamaha’s Ross Bird, of Eketahuna).
Letitia finished overall runner-up in the women’s category in the North Island Cross-Country Championship series.
