HAMPSHIRE-based Bike It Dixon Yamaha are celebrating an historic win in the World Motocross Championship.

The team from Swanmore in the Meon Valley were in raptures on Sunday when 21-year-old Billy Mackenzie won the second of the MX2 races in the Spanish Grand Prix at Bellpuig in Catalunya.

The Tichfield-based Scot won by 12 seconds from his former Dixon Yamaha team-mate Andrew McFarlane.

The hillside circuit at Bellpuig is not one of Mackenzie's favourites. He failed to qualify there last year and in the first of Sunday's races he crashed heavily, banging his head. Although re remounted he finished out of the points, but admitted: "I was happy with my lap times and I knew I had the speed for race two."

Mackenzie had been practising hard on improving his starts and it paid off as he made it up to third on the first corner. He swept past Alessio Chiodo to take second at the next turn, moved side by side with former Australian champion McFarlane and took him as well.

He said: "For the next few laps I was quite nervous as I am not used to leading GP races, but I kept my head and kept pushing and pushing.

"I never looked at my pit board and just listened for the bike behind me but after 20 minutes I had a big lead. I had a few minor problems when I started to lap slower riders so I dug deeper and actually increased my lead.

"Steve Dixon and the boys have worked hard to get me sorted out with the right suspension and the bike worked great, I was delighted I could repay them with a win.

"I feel confident this will be a turning point for me and hopefully I can give a repeat performance in Portugal next week."

Eastleigh-based team leader Dixon said: "I am delighted we have managed a race win with Billy, who has come through some tough times with injury and I am pleased for our sponsors who have stuck with us believing this day would come.

"Billy is the fifth rider in th team to win a GP race. I would like to think we helped four of them, Carl Nunn, Brian Jorgensen, Andrew McFarlane and now Billy to improve their careers. They all had their first GP wins on a Dixon Yamaha."

Victory takes the former British Championship runner-up to ninth in the MX2 Championship - just months after being sidelined by a bad foot injury.