Soren Staudinger

After an inconsistent year of up and downs and injuries and less bike time than I have had in years I am starting to feel like my bike fitness and race craft is coming back. Today was a really cool day of racing. I got to battle with some really talented riders and got to chase some super fast people, racing forward and backing myself even when the rain came. I definitely prefer being up front, watching and learning what are the better lines and building confidence. I think I finished third overall for today with some really good improvements in personal lap times since the last time we were here.

Lakes is my new local and it was prepped mint today for Round 5 of East Coast. It was so fast and it felt really good to be able to hit all the jumps and trust my bike and the work the track team had done. We got to ride some longer motos and the bike felt really like it has started to settle. All the set up testing we have done is starting to pay off and I have stopped fighting it and Dad. With the good weather lately we are been to spend more time out on sand tracks and bush tracks to learn more about my bike and myself. We are still getting used to the no live timing at some events or where to find any results so not sure where I am finishing on the day or overall for the series but I continue to try beat myself and find improvement using the Litpro.

We drove 6 hours up the coast and inland to compete at Moree for the third round of Ironman and it was definitely worth the trip finishing up 4th overall. After the fog finally cleared the track formed up really well, probably some of the best ruts I have seen in Australia so far and I got to rail ruts how I used to at Patetonga. I had fun and when I am having fun I ride better – I spent some time up front today with a holeshot and some laps lead and paid attention to the lines being taken by the faster riders. I am starting to feel more comfortable on the bike and it’s starting to show.

Had my first ride at Cessnock today after missing out on the season here last year due to injury. My starts were slow and I got caught mid pack at holeshot corner each time. This track has a really good flow and I was able to enjoy my seat time after I got over the frustration of my starts and used each race as passing practice especially around the many tight corners here. I had to think fast and creative to get around some defensive riders and came away with some positives and a long list of things to keep working on.

Welcome to my worst weekend of riding ever. The second round of NSW State Titles was muddy… the kind of deep, think, stinky mud which made my crappy attitude even worse. The starts were bad, and my head wasn’t in it and I wasn’t committing to jumps and was just being a general nuisance out there so Dad did something he has never done before… he pulled me off, called the day early and packed us up and left. It was a real wake up call that I was a danger to myself and everyone else out there with me. I had to face the truth that I have a lot of hard work ahead of me to get out of this rut and it mostly falls on me to put in the effort. I have had less ride time since we moved to Aussie than I have ever had before so it’s time to take a step back to decide what I want to do now and if it is moto – make some better plans, set some better goals and find my fire.

Dad and I headed back up to Coffs Harbour for Round 2 of the Ironman Series this weekend. Like last time we were here the track started off very muddy due to yesterdays rain but today dried through the day into a rutted, rough ride but I kept riding forward and went 4, 5, 5 in the Junior Lites 125cc class. Some of the distances we are now having to travel for races are so much longer than we had to do in NZ and I’m enjoying seeing different places and experiencing the strange Airbnb accommodations mum is finding for us.

This weekend I had my first taste of NSW State Titles which was held at our new local. It was bigger and faster than I thought it was going to be. The track formed up rough and dry, it lead to slippery areas on a pretty technical layout. I double classed in 125 Junior Lites and MX3 and had set myself some unrealistic expectations considering we were still working through bike set up and I hadn’t been in this race environment before. The race days were really long with massive gaps between my races so my old habits for eating and drinking didn’t match that well. I still have a lot to learn but there were a lot of positives that I took away. I think I finished 14th overall in each class which is not where I wanted to be but it’s a start point and we build from here.

We headed up to Coffs Harbour for Round 1 of East Coast MX and we knew it was going to be a crazy weekend when we were met by heaps of rain and realised we’d packed everything except for a paddle tyre. Practice was gnarly. It was muddy. It was deep, slippery and sticky and nothing like I’ve ridden before and in NZ I rode a lot of wet tracks. The races were fun. My starts was terrible and I dropped my bike at least 3 times in race 1 but kept picking it up and battled on. I tried some great lines and picked some terrible ones and have no idea where I finished up overall as the live timing had an issue but it was a good experience. Hopefully the next race day is a little less messy as the clean up was hard work.

After a really long break from moto for a lot of different reasons (moved to Aussie, broke my leg again, racing season ended, and we went travelling) we finally got racing this weekend at my new local track. I was nervous leading up to it but felt good once I was on the track. My starts were pretty bad but improved by race 3 and my goal was a top 10 finish and I achieved 9th overall in the 13-u16 125 junior lites. The track was mint and I feel like this was a good start to the season and a warm up for State Titles which are here next month. It’s going to be a busy year of riding new tracks, learning new bike set ups for me and Dad and a lot of road trips. It’s going to be awesome.

I was so glad I was cleared to ride in time for TTs because I had missed the last couple due to injury in 2021 and being overseas last year. The track was spread out over a massive section of farmland with ups and downs and a swampy “water feature” and it rained so much in the weeks leading up to this event. The pits were waterlogged and slippery so it was all sorts of chaos before racing started. It was foggy and damp but when the sun came out we had the best view out over the Waikato. We had 5 races over the two days, the track was long and fast and even with an off in the mud I finished about 7th overall. By the end the clean green paddocks were munted and there were hundreds of filthy happy people agreeing this had been the best event yet.