My first year in road racing is over with already. It has gone way too quick, but it has been a blast and I have no regrets about giving road racing a shot after I won the AMA Supermoto Championship in 2008.

It only feels like yesterday that I was setting out for my first laps at Phillip Island this time last year, coming in after my first sessions and feeling like Krusty did this past weekend. The only difference was that he had forgotten how fast it was and I just didn’t know at all back then!

I have found that no matter how many times we go there I always need a few sessions to get back up to speed, whereas most tracks when you go to them you can just get straight back down to decent lap times – I guess that’s one of the reasons Phillip Island is so good.

The final round of the ASBK series saw me have my best finish, while the whole of Team Joe Rocket Suzuki had a great weekend with Josh [Waters] winning both Superbike races and the title, Shawn [Giles] finishing second with his best results of the year and Robbie [Bugden] having one of his best finishes at Phillip Ssland and in the Supersport class.

I was able to win my first race in the first Supersport race of the weekend, with Chas Hern getting his first podium of the year also on a Suzuki.

It was a tough race to win, but in the conditions we had I think I was in really good position to get a win. It was half wet, half dry, and a few people had a lot to lose but I’ll take one when I get one. Only 0.080 separated Bryan [Staring] and I at the finish line, so he definitely didn’t let me have it without a fight. Finishing fourth in race two also meant I finished second overall, which was a good result to finish out the year.

Having such an awesome end to the year meant the team was ready to let their hair down at the presentation party on Sunday night. There were some sore heads the following morning, but we all had a great night and the whole Suzuki team deserved a few celebration drinks after the pressure they had to deal with over the final races of the year.

The superbike championship really came down to the wire but in the end it didn’t turn out to be as thrilling as we all first thought. Unfortunately Wayno [Wayne Maxwell] went down in some water in race one and Glenn [Allerton] put up a great fight, but Josh was too good on the weekend and was able to win the title.

So we are all done for the year now and I am excited for the new year already. Congratulations to all the champions this year. I’ll see you in the new year – Merry Christmas.

Troy