Dean Ferris retires from racing
Multiple Australian MX Champion, MXGP winner, AMA MX placegetter and Motocross of Nations representative, Dean Ferris, has retired from full-time riding, with the 32-year-old wrapping up his career at this year’s ProMX Australian Motocross Championship finale in Queensland.
Announced in August, this retirement is actually Ferris’s second, with the first made in March, 2021. Back then, Ferris was recovering from a major injury that included multiple vertebral fractures and broken ribs. However, the lure of the dirt and a renewed love of racing saw Ferris return to motocross at a handful of regional events before signing on with Team HRC Honda Racing in the MX1 class for the 2022 ProMX series.
On the CRF450R, Ferris started poorly in the season opener in Wonthaggi, but was winning motos by Round 2 in Mackay and in contention for the championship right up to the finale at Queensland Moto Park in August.
Ultimately, Ferris finished second overall behind CDR Yamaha’s Aaron Tanti, but is comfortable with this second – and final – retirement from full-time racing.
“I have made peace with this decision; I have two beautiful young daughters and an amazing wife. It is time that I make them number one,” Ferris said ahead of the final round on 20 August.
“Racing to win takes an enormous effort and it is time for me to call it quits on full-time racing and make my life about my family.”
Director of Honda Racing Australia, Yarrive Konsky, praised Ferris for his never-say-die approach to this year’s season and his overall career.
“Dean was a class act, winning the most overalls in the MX1 class and the most races. [He] refused to give up at any point and did whatever it took to be the best version of himself.
“Dean has been the consummate professional and we are proud of everything that we have achieved this year together.”
Ferris leaves the sport with an impressive resume, both domestically and internationally, highlights of which include three MX1 Australian championships, achieved with CDR Yamaha in 2016, 2017 and 2018, an individual podium in the MXoN and an MX2 class GP win in MXGP.
Growing up on a cattle farm in Kyogle, NSW, Ferris’s racing career started later than others, first competing as an 11-year-old. Although he achieved success immediately, the passing of his father in 2001 saw Ferris deprioritise racing for a few years until making a serious return as a 16-year-old. Progressing through juniors into the 125cc class, Ferris then stepped up to a factory team in 2008, followed by his 450cc debut as a privateer in 2010.
Ferris’s first taste of the FIM MX World Championship came in the same year, followed by full seasons in Europe from 2012 to 2015, starting in MXGP, then moving to the 250cc MX2 class in 2013. His best results came in the latter class, including a GP win, moto win and four other podiums.
Those results and his performance for Team Australia at the Motocross of Nations in 2013 led to a ride in the AMA SX series with Red Bull KTM in 2014. Ferris scored a few top 10s in the US, but injuries blunted his impact in that series, as they did in the 2015 MXGP season, leading to a return home and signing with CDR Yamaha for the 2016 MX Nationals.
In between winning the MX1 class of the MX Nationals three years in a row, Ferris made a one-off AMA MX appearance in 2017, stunning the US field to finish second in the opening moto and seventh overall.
In 2019, Ferris filled in for the injured Romain Febrve in MXGP, then went across to the US again to compete in the AMA MX series, substituting for the injured Aaron Plessinger. In six AMA rounds, Ferris achieved four Top 10 results, with a best moto finish of fifth.
With a lack of rides in the US and Europe, Ferris returned to Australia midway through 2019 and completed a partial season in the MX Nationals, this time with KTM. That should have set Ferris up for a strong tilt at a fourth domestic MX1 title in 2020, but COVID-19 saw the entire season cancelled, and it was in August, 2020, while practising for the 2021 season that Ferris suffered a serious training injury, fracturing four vertebrae and breaking ten ribs.
What was potentially a career-ending injury led to many months of rehab and the March, 2021, decision to retire. Ironically, getting back on a bike again relieved the ongoing back pain Ferris been suffering since the accident, which in turn led to the decision to come out of retirement and have a crack at the ProMX Australian MX Championship in 2022.
Back on a Honda for the first time in more than a decade, Ferris’s performances on the Team HRC Honda Racing CRF450R this year included clean sweeps of the Wodonga and Coffs Harbour rounds, a round win at Coolum I and six moto wins – the most of any other rider in the MX1 class this year.
Ferris’s immediate plans post-retirement are unknown at time of writing, but a coaching role has been mentioned.
