Callum Dudson: a perfect cross-country season
Four rounds, four wins: Rotorua's Dudson is the 2026 NZ cross-country champion.
By ROOST New Zealand desk · 17 October 2026
Four rounds, four wins, a perfect 100 points. You can't do any better than Callum Dudson did in the 2026 New Zealand Cross-Country Championships.
The Rotorua rider won the senior cross-country crown in 2024. He went into 2025 as defending champion on a Honda CRF450 and started well, winning round one at Waituna West. Multi-time champion Brad Groombridge then won rounds three and four near Gore and took the title back, while Dudson had to settle for second after what MNZ called "a tense and thrilling see-saw battle".
He answered that in 2026. The official series results sheet has Dudson on a Yamaha YZ450FX, winning every round. Eketahuna's Sheldon Brown (Honda) was second on 74 points, Otorohanga's Jayden McAloon (KTM) third on 69, and former junior champion Nixon Parkes fourth.
Cross-country is about lasting the distance and staying out of trouble over long races on farmland, and a clean sweep in that discipline is rare. That gives Dudson two senior titles in three seasons, and he now sets the standard for New Zealand's off-road racers.
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