CHAD REED
Chad Reed’s face appeared on the screen inside Marvel Stadium and the crowd erupted. Their hero was in the house for the 2019 Monster Energy Aus-X Open. Chad’s wife, Ellie, stood next to him as he sat on his #22 Honda CRF450R. Media focused their lenses on the pair’s face, Chad’s eyes welling with tears and Ellie’s filled with pride. After 22 years of professional racing, the greatest Australian motocross racer to ever live would announce his retirement at the end of the 2020 season.
It’s hard to describe the emotions within the stadium as Chad circulated around the track, receiving a standing ovation as he waved to the screaming fans. This would be the last time Chad would race as a professional athlete on Australian soil. It was a sense of absolute respect and pride, but also sadness. Chad has shown the world what being Australian is all about. He has raced and beaten the best in the world. He has taken hits and gotten up more times than we can count. He’s raced injured and he’s backed himself time and time again. He has won as a family man, broken records, remounted from one of the most spectacular crashes in history and beaten the most outstanding riders of the modern era.
Chad is Chad. There will be other successful Australian racers on the world scene but there will only be one Chad Reed.
Reed turned professional the same year that DIRT ACTION was born. The Adelaide Supercross in March 1998 was Reed’s first professional race, while DA was released just prior in February 1998. We have seen each and every step of Chad’s career. Here’s a year-by-year account of his rise and reign at the top of world motocross for over a decade.
From everyone at Dirt Action… Thanks, Chad.
1998 — TEAM SUZUKI (AUSTRALIA) SUZUKI RM250 TWO-STROKE
In the summer of 1997/98, Reed headed over as a 15-year-old to race in the New Zealand Motocross Championships. NZ allows 15-year-olds to compete in either junior or senior events and Reed wasn’t going to waste a day, so he headed over the ditch to race the big boys while still officially a junior in Australia.
But his 16th birthday on March 15 saw Reed unleashed in professional racing. His first event was the Adelaide Supercross Masters and many expected him to run towards the front but not really rock the establishment at the time. How wrong they were. Reed leapt from the gates and spent the next 11 laps hounding race leader, and cousin, Craig Anderson until the race was stopped due to a serious injury.
The boys gridded up again but a bad start stopped his dream of winning his first pro race and he climbed to an eventual fifth place. Still, notice was served. Reed, in his first major race on a 250cc two-stroke, was fast, fit and going places.
Motocross, in particular Hervey Bay, stopped the Reed train in its tracks. Nearing the final lap of a bar-to-bar, 30-minute battle with Andrew
