No bikes for Price at 2019 Finke

A six-time Finke winner in the bike category, Price has tried to do the double – win both bike and truck races – for the past few years, but has come up short each time, with a best placing in the trucks of second in 2016, but did win the bike category in 2016 and 2018.

Successive DNFs in 2017 and ’18 behind the wheel of his Geiser Bros. Trophy Truck has made Price hungry for victory in the truck category, but the decision to race trucks only this year was also made in order to protect the wrist injury he rode with at this year’s Dakar Rally.

Price recently had further surgery on his damaged scaphoid, including a bone graft to repair the damage originally incurred in December and aggravated at the Dakar in January.

"Racing only the truck is the safer option to know that I'll be ready for Dakar 2020,” Price explained.

“I'd like to focus on one category - and the one I haven't won yet. Bummed I'm missing out on the bikes, but I've got to look to the future and be smart about my injury at the moment.

“Maybe in 2020 we will do the bike again and see if I can get seven! The double is not out of sight, it's something I know I want to achieve in the future."

The 2019 Tatt’s Finke Desert Race is scheduled for 7 to 10 June (Queen’s Birthday Weekend). All 650 starting places in the bike category were filled on the same day entries opened in January, with truck entries similarly filling in record time.

For further details, go to: finkedesertrace.com.au