Hawkesbury Hornets BMX Club send a team to National Championships

The Hornets have sent a small but strong group that will take on the best riders in the country.

The event is taking place 190 kilometers north of Melbourne in the regional centre of Shepparton.

The Greater Shepparton City Council and local BMX Club have been preparing for the National Championships for the past six months and are ready to host the major event.

This years track features a newly constructed state-of-the-art eight meter start hill for elite riders of the competition.

There is also wonderful facilities for the thousands that are expected to attend the week long event.

In total there is 1547 entrants from 99 Australian clubs. The ages of competitors range from four-years-old to 67-years-old and will compete at a variety of different levels.

Hawkesbury Junior BMX sensation, Kale Warner, who moved to the area from Queensland last year, will be leading the hornets team of 10.

Warner has had plenty of success throughout his young riding career having previously won the Australian 16 years title in 2017 while at Nerang BMX Club at the Gold Coast.

He backed this up with a stellar year in 2018 but was unable to the get past the motos (rounds) early at the national championships that were held in Bunbury.

Throughout the national series he finished third overall while taking on older and more experienced riders in the superclass standings.

This was backed up by a fifth place finish at the season's end of the competitive junior elite field.

Also in 2018 Kale rode in the Elite A Pro Class [an opens class], just one level below the world's top riders, at the USA BMX Grands in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

He made to the quarter-finals where he faced riders that were at least four years his senior.

Another young rider from the club attending is seven-year-old Jack Lupton, who is only in his second year of racing and last year manged to finish 8^th in the finals of the Grands.

The other riders that are joining Kale at natioanls are:

The 2019 BMX Australia National Championships is one of BMX Australia's biggest events of the year and one that resonates across the 120 member clubs in the country.

The event began with practice for riders on Monday and Tuesday, May 20 and 21.

Today (Wednesday), May 22 will see the inaugural Pro Spectacular for the more elite riders take place.

This will be followed by the cruiser and challenge (age groups) classes on Thursday and Friday, May 23 and 24.

Saturday, March 25 will round out the full week of racing as the championship events and elite classes fight for the coveted A1 plate, awarded to the national champion.