|
A Frosty win
at Shillingstone.
Airborne at Shillingstone
Report: Garry Alan
- Images: Imageconsortium.co.uk
Round 2 - SCEC Cross Country Championship series, Shillingstone
Forest, Dorset.
By any standard Shillingstone Forest rates as one of the finest
forest based venues in the South of England. The mixture of wide and
fast flowing tracks, knadgery winding paths, tricky cambers, monster
hills and beautiful scenery make it really special, and over the last
10 years the crew at SCEC have got to know the place pretty well.
Parking limitations restrict the entry to around 140 riders leading
to many disappointed entrants, but those that got their entries in
early enough were blessed with perfect weather to enjoy this little
bit of Enduro heaven.
No two events here are ever the same - who can forget the wet one two
years ago! This years was a little faster and rather less technical
than in previous years, but if the number of riders stopping to shake
the clerk of the course’s hand at the end were anything to go by,
none the worse for that! A sign of the times maybe…
At Eleven o’clock sharp the flag dropped signalling the start of the
2007 ‘Bluebell Enduro’. It would be around 18 minutes before the
first of the championship boys would appear at the end of their first
lap. When they did it was the hot favourite Andy Frost in the lead,
followed just 3 seconds later by a hard charging Gary Player and a
few seconds later the smooth riding Gary Wright. These 3 were giving
it everything they had, and would continue to do so for the full 3
hours, even the brash that littered the route on the early laps did
little to slow them down. For a while it looked like Dakar hopeful
Stan Watt might just spoil their party until a monstrous crash whilst
attempting to pass slower riders ‘off-piste’ tempered his
enthusiasm somewhat.
As the race progressed Andy gradually extended
his lead to around 30 seconds, which by the end allowed him to just
sneak in an extra lap, but the two Garys continued their tooth and
nail fight right to the very end - remarkably when the flag
eventually dropped just 3 seconds separated them - just as it had
been on their first lap! Andy Scudamore brought his KTM home in 4th
and a very bruised and battered Stan Watt rounded out the top 5.
With 27 Experts lined up, including a few new faces to SCEC, nobody
really knew quite what to expect. Everyone that is except Mark
Cornick. Continuing his recent form Mark was quite literally flying.
Only Freddie Broadway could keep him in sight, but even Freddie had
to concede nearly 2 minutes to Mark by the end. Mik Hill, Gary McCoy
and Brad Armstrong had their own little battle (but having started on
different minutes didn’t know it!) and ended up 3rd,4th and 5th
respectively.
When an event is as enjoyable as this one everyone’s a winner, but
as always there are one or two riders that really stand out. Here
that rider had to be Peter Archer. Peter proved once again that Over
40 doesn’t necessarily mean over the hill. He finished a full lap up
on the rest of his class and remarkable 11th overall, thrashing most
of the experts in the process!
RESULTS:
Championship
1st Andy Frost
2nd Gary Player
3rd Gary Wright
4th Andy Scudamore
5th Stanley Watt
Expert
1st Mark Cornick
2nd Fredie Broadway
3rd Mik Hill
4th Gary Mccoy
5th Brad Armstrong
Over 40
1st Peter Archer
2nd Chris Boyce
3rd Paul Hart
4th Patrick Wills
5th Neil Shinner
Clubman E1
1st Ian Shuttleworth,
2nd Jon-Paul Oconnell
3rd Gareth Thurgood
4th Richard Middleton
5th Andrew Lawrence
Clubman E1
1st Kevin Barnes
2nd Tyson Mayton-Jones
3rd Steve Whetman
4th Tony Primmer
5th Craig Orton
Sportsman
1st Pete Fry
2nd Nigel Martin
3rd Nigel Perring
4th Russell Harris
5th Colin Wilkins
Next Round, 22nd July at Ansty.
Biker Comments: Sorry no
pictures are labelled, but
I had no information on who the riders were.
|
