DECEMBER 22, 2025: The Christmas rush should be over by December 25, but that doesn’t mean things will really be slowing down at all for many hundreds of people.
In fact, life will be speeding up considerably for New Zealand’s elite motorcycle racers, their followers and thousands of devoted bike enthusiasts.
Yes, we can expect the festive magic to roll on for at least another 24 hours after Christmas as Whanganui stages its traditional Boxing Day motorcycle race meeting, the Suzuki International Series’ third and final round on the city’s world-famous Cemetery Circuit.
We can just hope that the police are looking the other way on Friday when motorbike riders take over the public streets of Whanganui.
Racers are expected to hare down Ridgeway St, along Wilson St, turn into Taupo Quay and Heads Rd, before looping around Guyton St and back into Ridgeway again, all of it at eye-watering speeds, often in excess of 200km/h.
There is no doubt that these riders will ignore stop signals, fail to give way and, most probably, swerve across the centre line at every opportunity.
And there are very few places in the world where this can happen, Whanganui being transformed again this year to host the traditional Suzuki International Series finale, a jam-packed day of racing around the city’s famous Cemetery Circuit.
For more than half a century, since 1951 in fact, the barriers have been put up for this world-renowned motorcycle “street fight”, with straw bales positioned and spectator fencing laid out along the gutters of Whanganui’s public streets.
The 2025 edition of the always-popular Suzuki International Series kicked off at the Taupo International Motorsport Park on the first weekend in December and round two was staged at Manfeild, in Feilding, just a week later.
All that remains now for the series to wrap up is for the world-renowned Cemetery Circuit races to go ahead on Boxing Day, the massive annual post-Christmas festival of speed always a popular final blow-out before New Year celebrations begin.
The racing on the twists and turns of Whanganui’s public streets – with part of the circuit actually zig-zagging the riders past the Suzuki New Zealand headquarters on Heads Road – attracts worldwide interest every year, especially since this is one of the very few motorcycle street fights still being run anywhere in the world.
And, yes, the course does take the speeding riders past headstones in the inner-city graveyard, not to mention the competitors zooming close to road-side curbs, across white-painted lines, over railway lines and near to traffic islands. It takes your breath away just to think about it, although serious safety measures are in place.
Bay of Plenty’s reigning New Zealand superbike champion Mitch Rees leads the way in the premier class once again this year and he will take some beating.
However, while the Whakatane man tops the 1000cc formula one/superbike class, he may be as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs on Friday when he calculates the risks and rewards in his attempt to achieve an historic five-in-a-row win streak on Boxing Day.
Mitch Rees previously won the formula one class overall in the Suzuki International Series in 2020, 2022, 2023 and last Christmas too (the series was not run in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic).
Meanwhile, the Robert Holden Memorial (RHM) feature race will no doubt be one of the highlights of Whanganui’s finale on the Cemetery Circuit.
It is a prestigious race that was won by Mitch Rees in 2022, 2023 and 2024, by his late brother Damon Rees in 2020 and by their father Tony Rees on seven occasions (between 1990 and 2016).
It could have been another Rees family battle at the front this year too, with 58-year-old “elder statesman” Tony Rees chasing hard early on in the 2025 series, until his unfortunate crash at Manfeild less than two weeks ago sent him to the sidelines.
With a broken ankle, Tony Rees has declared he is not going to line up in Whanganui on Friday.
“I haven’t had too many broken bones over the years,” said a philosophical Tony Rees this week. “But when you’re pushing hard, sometimes it goes wrong. Even the best riders in the world can crash.”
Instead, it will likely be Rogan Chandler who poses the greatest threat to Mitch Rees on Boxing Day, the Upper Hutt man just three points behind Mitch Rees as they head onto the track for the first time on Friday morning.
All the other various classes too will provide nail-biting excitement, the racing always close around the Cemetery Circuit, while it’s worth noting that Whanganui crews will be out in force in the formula one, formula two and Pre-82 classic sidecars classes.
Rounds one and two, at Taupo and Manfeild respectively, gave bike fans, enthusiasts, supporters, sponsors plenty to salivate over and they’ve shown how highly they value and love the competition that they’ve shown up in great numbers to watch it live and personal.
“It’s been a fantastic series so far, with great racing throughout the classes,” said Suzuki International Series organiser Allan ‘Flea’ Willacy.
“The competition has been good. The weather’s been perfect and we’ve seen great crowds. The local heroes, and the overseas competitors too, have not let us down and they’ve put on a great show.
“We’re all looking forward now to the final round.”
Leaders after two rounds in the 2025 Suzuki International Series are: Whakatane’s Mitch Rees (formula one); Auckland’s Cameron Leslie (formula two/supersport 600); Silverdale’s Tyler King (formula three); Silverdale’s Tyler King (supersport 300); Paraparaumu’s Richard Markham-Barrett (formula sport, senior, over-600cc); Feilding’s Jordan Walters (formula sport, junior, up to 600cc); Auckland’s Paul Pavletich (Pre 89 post classics, senior, over-600cc); Auckland’s Scott Findlay (Pre 89, post classics junior, under-600cc); Upper Hutt’s Keiran Mair (Pre 95, post classics senior, over-600cc); Te Awanga’s Eddie Kattenberg (Pre 95, post classics junior, under-600cc); Tokomaru’s Barry Smith/Whanganui’s Louise Blythe and Panmure’s Adam Unsworth/Whanganui’s Bryce Rose (F1 sidecars) first equal; Whanganui’s Tracey Bryan & Jo Franzen (F2 sidecars); Whanganui’s Richie Dibben (supermoto).
The Suzuki International Series is supported by Suzuki New Zealand, Mondiale VGL, Auto Super Shoppe Tawa, Givi, I-Tools, Bridgestone tyres, Metzeler tyres, Sharp As Linehaul Ltd Whanganui, TSS Motorcycles, Ipone, Inferno Design & Digital, Kiwibike Motorcycle Insurance Specialists, Shark, Barred Up Scaffolding, The Dentists.
DATES FOR 2025 SUZUKI INTERNATIONAL SERIES
- Round 1, Taupo, Dec 6-7;
- Round 2, Manfeild, Feilding, Dec 13-14;
- Round 3, Whanganui’s Cemetery Circuit, Dec 26.
