YOUNG Robinvale bike racer Nicholas Boyd is preparing for his biggest event to date, with the 17-year-old gearing up to compete at the Finke Desert Race over the Queen’s Birthday Long Weekend.
Finke is an off-road, multi terrain two-day race through desert country from Alice Springs to the small Aputula community and crosses the Finke River, which is believed to the oldest river in the world.
Boyd will be competing alongside some of the biggest names in motorsport including seven-time winner Toby Price, who will be looking to secure his second win in the Car Category after taking six wins on a bike.
He will ride be a KTM 500 EXC-F in Class 02 which is for four stroke bikes over 451CC. He’s competing against 74 other riders in the class including some mates whoinspired his decision to enter.
“I’ve got a couple of mates who are doing it and I thought I would tag along with them and race with them,” Boyd said.
Boyd has competed at the Hattah Desert Race in the past and while his experience will assist him to a certain extent, he will be in completely different terrain and on a different bike.
“I started off pretty young racing with mates,” he said.
“It is pretty much just a hobby but we were racing as much as we could and it has now led to this.”
Nick’s father Jeremy is extremely proud of his son’s decision to take on the challenge and is looking forward to the adventure next weekend.
“I just asked Nick one day out of interest if he would be interested in doing it,” he said.
“We knew some people who did it last year and they were able to get an idea of the conditions.
They have seen Nick ride bikes and said there’s no doubt that Nick could could do it.
So I thought why don’t we have a go at it.”
Jeremy has declared that the event is going to be a great experience, with the goal to simply finish the race.
“Given it’s his first year, he is going to be a bit apprehensive because he is in there with the big boys,” he said.
“He is only 17 and he is up some pretty seasoned campaigners.
Don’t get me wrong, once he gets out there he will race but the most important thing is to finish.”
In the lead up to the race, his bike is being prepared by Sam Monk in Swan Hill.
“He is pretty excited about heading up,” Jeremy said.
“Hopefully he will get there and back, that’s the main concern. If we decide to head up again next year I think he’d give it much more of a go.”
