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Beautiful sunny winter Taupo weather on Saturday attracted 130 riders to the Centennial Park Motor Raceway for the third of the six rounds of the 1999 Suzuki Motorcycle Road Race Series.
The slickly run 24 race programme provided excellent, tight, spectacular, and injury free racing enjoyed by many spectators, with tight tussles from front to rear of each field in each class.
The blue ribbon Sports Production classes, where both 600cc & Open Class bikes race together, saw the nimbleness of the smaller 600\'s around the twisty bits, then the sheer \"grunt\" of the 1000cc bikes in a straight line.
In the Open Class, Brian Bernard from Wanganui riding a Suzuki TL1000, while still leading the series, could only take one win, being bettered by Hamilton\'s Jared Love (Suzuki GSXR750) in 2 races.
Corey Oxenham from Mt. Maunganui riding a Kawasaki ZX6R, took two wins out of three in the 600cc class from Palmerston North\'s Warren Turner (Yamaha R6) to regain a slender lead in this class.
Troy O\'Donoghue (Kawasaki ZXR400), last years Formula 3 Plus class winner, hit top form again by winning all 3 races, plus the Red Baron Motorcycles \"best presented\" bike award, in this class. He now lies 3rd overall in the series to date in this class to Tauranga riders Bill van den Hoeven & Glen Tanner
First female in this year\'s series was Alana Young from Palmerston North, who gained 6th place overall in the ATV Quad races while her husband Paul was 2nd overall in the same class, both riding Yamaha\'s.
A significant increase in rider numbers in the RK Chain A grade, Shoei Helmets B grade, Pirelli Tyres C grade, & Kawasaki Novice classes at each event sees many new riders being drawn to this entertaining and challenging sport for the first time. This 1999 Suzuki Road Race Series puts great emphasis into attracting and training riders, supported by excellent sponsor backup and prizes.
