Groombridge, 25, had finished third outright at the Tarawera 100 race in 2013, and was overall runner-up in 2014 and last year as well, making him easily one of the more fancied contenders to win this year's 39th annual edition of the great race.
But he was up against a four-time previous Tarawera 100 winner, Mount Maunganui's Cody Cooper, as well as a solid line-up of other top-class dirt bike racers with varying degrees of motocross, enduro and cross-country backgrounds, and each one of them tough and extremely capable of winning the arduous battle.
Cooper won the Tarawera 100 for the first time in 2007, then backed that up by winning it three more times, in consecutive years between 2010 and 2012, but he met his match in Groombridge this time around.
The venue for Saturday's race was again on steep farmland at Te Teko and when the shotgun blast signalled the race start at about 10am, Groombridge initially found himself behind 10 or 12 fast starters and with plenty of work to do in the gruelling 140km race.
"My start was okay, but nothing too magnificent," Groombridge said.
"But I made up a lot of ground early on and actually got into the lead after about 5km, just before we headed into the bush for the first time.
"Then I crashed and Scotty Columb (from Queenstown), Liam Draper (Howick) and Cody Cooper went past me. Then they took a wrong turn and I managed to spot the error quickly, spin around and get back on track. With that, I was up to about third, with Liam and Hadleigh Knight (Reporoa) ahead of me.
"I think Liam then had bike problems and so then it became a two-way battle after that between me and Cody for the win."
Of the 122 race starters, 110 were finishers, with only 43 riders completing four laps in the three hours.
