Rev-head Rowling

Turramurra local Mark Rowling will compete in the 250cc Polini Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island from 14 to 16 October this year.

Mark Rowling in action, we're no experts, but this looks like a motorbike.

In his other life, Rowling is the proprietor of Turramurra Cyclery. Rowling has only been riding motorbikes since 1990.

"I've been on pushbikes since I was 12 but I fell into motorbike racing really. One of the guys at work suggested I try track racing and I've been hooked ever since."

In 2000, three years after starting to race competitively, he went in the Grand Prix and surprised himself by "going quite well." In every Grand Prix thereafter, he has suffered a run of bad luck. In one particularly bad accident in 2003, running outright second in the Championship, Rowling crashed at 230km per hour a week before the Grand Prix. For that he says he got "nearly a minute and a half of TV coverage."

His passion for motorbike racing has not dented Rowling's initial love of cycling. He still rides over 500km a week with Turramurra pushbike racing club. Rowling says he gets "fantastic support from club members and customers.

"I've never seriously injured myself on a pushbike but I've broken so many things on the motorbike it's not funny. I read Mick Doohan's autobiography when I started racing motorbikes and there was a list of all his injuries and I thought 'Why would you do it?' A few months ago we counted up all my injuries and I must have almost been on par with him,"

Despite his extensive list of injuries, Rowling has rarely been tempted to give up the sport. "In 2003 when I crashed the week before the Grand Prix, broke my pelvis and had to be taken away by helicopter was probably the only time I thought, 'I don't want to do this any more' but the thing is, you just can't wait to get better.

"It's such a mental challenge to put together 12 corners. It's not so much an adrenalin rush but like a big puzzle you have to put together."

Of the future the 34 year-old sportsman says, "I'm still getting better. I think I've got a few more years in me yet."