2016 Paeroa Battle of the Streets
The 2016 Paeroa Battle of the Streets has been and gone and the organisers, sponsors, competitors and crowds couldn’t have asked for a better day. With a decent entry-list and the fact that the race was cancelled at the last minute in 2015 due to rain, the crowds were bigger than ever with the streets of the Waikato town full to the brim.
With bikes on track shortly after 8am, the volunteers who put the track together had obviously done a great job under the cover of darkness to get the fences and barriers in place and the circuit handed over to the Auckland Motorcycle Club on time.
Big names this year included Scotty Moir, Toby Summers, Ray Clee, Daniel Mettam, Shane Richarson and obviously the Rees family, with Paeroa veteran Tony competing on the CBR1000RR while his son, Damon, campaigned the Formula 2 class on the CBR600RR.
In the first Formula 1 race it was business as usual, with Tony getting the holeshot and leading the race from start-to-finish. It wasn’t all easy though with Scotty Moir and Toby Summers pushing the veteran hard and making him work for the win. But Tony knows how to win at Paeroa and kept his cool despite the intense pressure, finally pulling a gap in the final few laps. Next up for the big guns was King of the Streets, with the fastest lappers of the morning sessions seeing an “all in” race which saw Tony and Damon on the track at the same time. Again Tony was in devastating form, taking the win ahead of the combined group of riders. The final race didn’t go the way Rees would have liked, bogging on the line and getting swamped to the Bike Rider Magazine corner at the end of the start/finish straight. Tony didn’t want to let the leaders get away and tried an aggressive move into the Bridgestone hairpin at the end of the back straight which saw the Honda tying itself in knots as Rees tried to out-brake Summers into the corner. It looked like Rees was going to collect Summers but just managed to get his machine under control before running wide. And that was the end of his campaign, pulling off into the pits at the end of the first lap with a steering dampener issue first reported before an arm-pump issue was declared. Holding onto a 200hp superbike isn’t an easy thing, especially when you can’t feel your arms…
Moir and Summers traded paint for the rest of the race, with Scotty building a gap before running too deep into a corner and letting Summers gain an advantage. But Moir kept his cool, taking the chequers.
In other classes Shane Richardson took out F2 with Damon posting an impressive second despite this being his first time at Paeroa. Jette Josiah, son of legend Russell only got his F2 machine the night before the race, so coming home in third is an amazing effort.
The Motards were as spectacular as ever, with Scotty Moir taking the win again ahead of Casey Bullock, while in the Post Classic sidecars it was the last race for the impressive Bill Richardson and his swinger Julie Loveridge.
Honda had an impressive display of new machines in the Countdown car park while Suzuki were in their usual spot in the centre of the circuit meaning there was plenty of machinery for the spectators to look at when they weren’t glued to the racing. Honda also had a prize draw for a Honda GROM, with Richards Holmes, of Browns Bay Auckland taking home a new motorbike, something I can’t imagine he expected when he left for Paeroa in the morning.
It was great to see street racing in Paeroa back to its excellent self once again, and here’s hoping we get to see the Battle of the Streets in February for many years to come. For a full report check out the next issue of Bike Rider Magazine.
