KTM Australia press release:

Defending AORC Champion Toby Price has kicked his title defence off in perfect fashion, winning both days outright at the weekend’s opening rounds of the Australian Off-Road Championship at Kilkivan, near Gympie.

The KTM Off-Road Racing Team rider was relentless in his assault on the track as he powered his KTM 500 EXC to victory ahead of Beau Ralston and Lachy Stanford on Saturday, and leading home Chris Hollis and Ralston today.

In the E3 class, Price led a KTM Off-Road Racing Team 1-2 on both days, with young teammate Daniel ‘Chucky’ Sanders claiming double doses of runner-up on his KTM 300 EXC.

Sanders surprised himself and underlined his presence as a major player for 2015 in the second sprint on Saturday morning by winning Outright.

The KTM team’s E2 contender Tye Simmonds got his very first taste of AORC competition in Queensland, but quickly set about trying to tame his substantial raw speed and aggression to get the best out of the sprint format.

Simmonds recovered from a couple of crashes on Saturday which relegated him to seventh outright yesterday, to take fifth overall and an E2 podium today.

Toby Price: “That’s the start you definitely always hope for – to come out on top in both rounds is a great start to the season. KTM’s working hard and we’ve always got the support behind us, so it’s good to repay them with a couple of wins. The first day was a bit of a rough day; we didn’t quite start off too well in the first test. One rider had a couple of little mishaps in front of me, and I got caught up in his dust and couldn’t see a thing at all. It meant the rest of the crew that started behind could make a lot of ground on us, but we came out on top on the Saturday, and today we felt good, stayed up the whole time, and put down some good lap times. It’s good to be on that 500 again, it’s an awesome bike, and it suited the conditions on the weekend very well.”

Daniel ‘Chucky’ Sanders: “We haven’t gotten too bad a start to the year. Sort of where I expected to be I suppose. I finished sixth and seventh outright, so I got some good points and escaped a few crashes injury free so I can’t complain. I got on the new bike and the motor they’ve built me was just magnificent, so I was having heaps of fun on it. We’ll just do some fine tuning with the suspension before the next round at Corner Inlet and it will be perfect. Winning that lap outright yesterday was amazing! At first I couldn’t believe it and I waited for a few minutes for a few more riders to come through but a bit of luck went my way. So that’s one goal ticked off! The next one is to work on breaking into the top three outright for a round.”

Tye Simmonds: “I’m happy to get that first one out the road, it was frustrating to have two crashes on the first day, when I was just trying to push too hard. Ben and Toby were just drumming it into me to relax a bit more, back it down, don’t make so many mistakes and don’t lose so much time – not ride it like a motocross track where you just push and pin it. Toby was pumping it into me all weekend, but it took a couple of days for it get into my system I guess. I loved being back on the 450, the 350 was really good for enduro-cross, but it’s good to have that bit of extra power and be back on the big girl again.”

Ben Grabham, team manager: “We had a good first two rounds of the AORC. It was obviously very hot, dusty and a track you didn’t want to take too many risks on, but we came away with some really good results. Obviously Toby had pretty much the dream weekend, winning E3 on both days, and the outright. It wasn’t all smooth sailing, he had a decent crash on day one, but after that he got his act together and rode really strong. Apples (Sanders) had a good weekend, he got second to Toby in the E3 on both days, and a sixth and a seventh outright, but to be honest I think it was a great weekend for him. I wouldn’t say it was the ideal two-stroke track but he still went real well on it. I think Tye enjoyed his first one, he got fourth in E2 on the first day, and then he got on the podium for E2 today. The bikes have all gone really well, the mechanics have done a great job, and we’re pretty happy with how it all kicked off.”

For more information on KTM motorcycles visit www.ktm.com.au or www.facebook.com/ktmaustralia.