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Check out Shayne King`s Website: - for Shayne`s profile, news, photos and while you`re there, sign his guestbook.
2003 Motocross of Nations, Zolder, Belgium:
Sunday October 5th 2003.
The Kiwi team of Josh Coppins, Ben Townley and Shayne King rode to well deserved fourth placing on Sunday in front of 23,000 cheering MX fans.
Leading up to the main race of the day the New Zealand team were odds on favourites for a podium finish, with Josh convincingly winning semi-final number two and his teammates Ben and Shayne well placed.
However, the dream started to come apart in the main race with Ben going down very hard in the first turn ending the young Kiwi star’s race weekend. That left a big job for Shayne and Josh to try and get a decent result with only two riders, the Kiwi’s woes were not to end with the loss of Ben Townley – Shayne suffered a major set back on lap one, losing his left handgrip and having to fight the deep sand of Zolder for 35 minutes with just a shiny alloy bar end to hang on to!
“I got a great top fifteen start and being a late substitution for the New Zealand team (due to Daryl Hurleys exclusion due to injury) was placed at the very outside of the start gate which meant I managed to avoid the carnage on the inside of the turn that caught Ben out. As I went into the turn I felt my left grip starting to move! Then it just came completely off in my hand! I just couldn’t believe it! It took me a good 10-15 minutes to adjust to riding and hanging on with no grip, but then I started to move forward and started picking up a lot of the places I had lost earlier. My mechanic ‘Jimmy’ (Glenn Macartney) was keeping me well informed via the trusty pit board and at one stage I saw that we had dropped to sixth place, I turned on the afterburner and gave it everything I could and managed to get myself up to 14th place which was good enough with Josh’s 5th placing to put the team in 4th” said Shayne
Ben was very disappointed as he felt he had a good shot at a top five placing and talking after the race said “ I was coming into the first turn and just got shunted from behind. The next thing I knew I was getting run over and bikes were everywhere! Josh and Shayne did us proud and got a great result for New Zealand”
Also speaking after the race, Josh said “ I got an awesome start running with Smets and Everts, I ran with them for the first few laps and was feeling very good. Carmichael passed me and then I was sitting comfortably in 4th place, but towards the end of the race I made a mistake in the sand section and Gordon Crockard (Ireland) passed me and I ended up 5th. All in all it was a great weekend for New Zealand!”
The New Zealand team get cleaned up and arrive back home in the next few weeks, Josh will be staying on in Europe and having a screw removed from his foot and taking a few weeks off to recover, Ben has the last Dutch Championship race this coming weekend before returning home and gearing up for the Labour Weekend Motocross: in his home town of Taupo. It should be a great weekend and Shayne and Ben are looking forward to racing with each other – hope to see some of you there!
For more info on the MX of Nations log on to: motogp.com:
