KEY POINTS:
Everything is falling into place for Hawera's Daryl Hurley.
The Team Suzuki No 1 rider has been in scintillating form in the New Zealand Supercross Championships series thus far and Saturday night's hat-trick of wins at the second of four rounds in Tokoroa was business as usual for the 31-year-old.
He also won all three open class races at the series opener near Motueka a fortnight ago, so there were few raised eyebrows when the Kiwi international continued the trend at Tokoroa's purpose-built supercross stadium at the weekend.
It has been a bit of a purple patch for the Suzuki star. He wrapped up the national 500cc motocross crown in November and now seems on target to complete the double for this season, winning titles at the outdoor and stadium versions of the sport.
Next best was fellow Team Suzuki rider Scott Columb, the man from Queenstown coming in as runner-up in all three open class races, with Kawasaki pair Nick Saunders (Taupo) and Jesse Wiki (Hamilton) also on the pace, finishing third and fourth overall respectively on the night.
Hurley said the formula was pretty simple. "The team works hard during the week and the results come at the weekend. I'm glad Scotty [Columb] came back to us from Europe this season. He scored points in the motocross world championships in 2007. Any rider who can score points at a GP has got to be good."
But Hurley must be even better, easily beating his teammate who has GP experience. Columb summed it up: "Hurley was just too good again tonight. He gets good starts and just dictates terms in the race after that. He's tough and he's smart."
Columb can probably expect more of the same from his Suzuki Team leader at the next round of the series, at the TelstraClear Events Centre in Manukau on February 16.
Meanwhile, Columb also featured at the front of the small bike (lites) class, although he was beaten again, this time by another Suzuki teammate, Hawera's Luke Burkhart.
Burkhart finished 1-1-2 in the three races, while Columb managed 2-2-1, taking advantage in the night's final race when Burkhart crashed while leading. However, Columb continues to lead the lites class, after a strong performance at round one - although his advantage over Burkhart has now been shaved to one point.
Another dual-class ironman was Wiki (Hamilton), who shone at Tokoroa, finishing 3-4-3 in the lites to move up to third in the standings.
