Cranbrook’s history-making weekend

Cranbrook Districts Motorcycle Club will create history this weekend, holding their first WA Motocross round at the Sukey Hill track, with more than 200 competitors taking part.

It will be the first State motocross round to be held in the Great Southern since the 1980s, when Albany’s Miniup Park was up and running.

WAMX junior and senior rounds will be held at the new track, attracting riders from Esperance, Kalgoorlie and Geraldton.

CDMC was formed in 2012 and only built the Sukey Hill track in 2017.

A newly constructed pedestrian bridge and camping ablution block will be unveiled at the historic weekend event.

State riders from the Great Southern who will be in action include Paul Smithson (Kendenup), Camball McMahon (Kendenup), Braydon Baynes (Broomehill), Corben Weinert (Albany) and Declan Hepworth (Albany).

Hepworth sits in fourth place in the amateur cup championship heading into the Cranbrook round, while Weinert is 33 points adrift of series leader Regan Duffy in the MX2 division.

Smithson will compete in the veterans class and is currently third in the standings.

McMahon is in fourth place in the 100-125cc 13-16years division, but is within 29 points of the leader.

Round 3 of the Junior State MX Championships will be run on Saturday before round 4 of the Senior MX Championships is held on Sunday.

CDMC president Justin Shepherd said his club had done a lot of work recently to secure this event.

“At this stage we are looking at 250 riders plus,” Shepherd said.

“So there is a lot of people coming to check it all out.

“Its quite big. We’ve never held this many riders on a weekend before, so it will be a full-on weekend. But (the venue) can hold a lot of competitors and we have room for spectators.

“We have put in a bridge that spectators can head over and check out the inside of the track, which is quite rare, and there is 360 viewing around the track.

“A lot of work has gone in over the last two-three years to get the club and track where it is and we’ve only just moved up here, but to have a (State) round in the Great Southern is long overdue.”

The event has received great support from the Shire of Cranbrook and Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries, and stage two of the Sukey Hill development will be opened by O’Connor MP Rick Wilson.