Greymare- 25th January 2009

Greymare just a 25 minute drive from home, lovely!

A typical Overcast chilly January day greeted us all for this one, almost perfect enduro weather. With the rain we had all week I knew it was going to be a wet one, I wasn’t disappointed!
Had a quick chat with Francis Banfield soon after I arrived, he’d been out on the working party on the course the day before and promptly told me the track was, um, tricky to day the least!
The queue for scrutineering was like the lost baggage department at Heathrow terminal 5! Debbie tucker came over for a chat and I also had a chat to Jamie paget who was behind us in the now lengthy queue. After this it was down the hill to the start to get the bike parked up ready for the off.

Onto the start itself then, I didn’t make a bad one, probably top ten as we entered the woods but got passed by a few as I promptly got stuck on a root! Soon after the first mile things began to get very interesting indeed. The woods and roots were very slippery indeed and with a trials tyre only allowed on the back wheel, throttle control was at a premium. The hills were a nightmare and you can always tell that things are going to be tough when you’ve got 4 or 5 marshals standing there to help you just in case. One slope in particular was to test even the most skillful of riders, being about quarter of a mile long and as slippery as you could possibly imagine with grip being almost non existent, you just had to ’pin it’ and hope for the best, and that was only about 15 mins into the lap!

Some of the small hills In the woods although not technical, proved out to be tricky as well, as the low winter sun shone straight into your eyes and you simply couldn’t see where you were going, again you just had to twist the throttle and hope you was going in the right direction.
The only way of a rest bite came with a couple of fire roads mixed into the course, but they only lasted a few hundred yards at most, so not much rest at all really!

Due to extremely soft conditions the long slog back up to the lap scoring seemed like an eternity to get to the top and most of the way I was ‘paddling’ in order not to come off to get to the top.
A tough enduro course in the conditions, about 8 to 9 miles long
With about 1 ½ hours on the clock riders were beginning to take a rest already by the side of the course as the tough conditions began to take there toll on rider and machine. Some of the ruts in the woods were now ‘up to the saddle’ and the rooty hills were becoming a battle to get to the top.

With about 2hrs 15 mins gone in the race and I pitted with Steve Tizzard there to give us a hand. I thought I could get another 2 laps in before the clock ran out, I knew it would be tight with the long laps and the state of the track, but I went for it.
I think my last lap turned out to be my slowest due a couple of ‘offs’ and simply being ‘cream crackerd’ due to the amount of effort that I’d spent during the race. I was really pushing it on one of the fire roads when before I could say ‘oh b*llocks‘, I went down like a sack of (you know what) as my front wheel went away from me and I hit the deck pretty hard. I got up and made sure I was ok and more importantly I hadn’t broken a brake/clutch or gear lever on the bike (which is my favorite game at the moment), and carried on. That crash ultimately cost me another lap as I came in frustratingly 1 min overtime. Aaaaargh!

If there had been a rock section and some tractor tyres as obstacles added to the course, then this event would not have been far off an extreme one! It really was tough going today as the results show, over a third of the field retiring or DNF’ing for some reason or another.

Being a local event I spoke to a lot of riders after, Andrew Smith, Mark Tucker, Colin George, Francis Banfield, Adam Blake, Jed Treleaven, Arthur Johnson, Rich Tucker, Jack Twentyman, everyone of them thought it was hard today, not just me then!
A round of applause again to Camel Vale mcc, No matter what the conditions, they always put on a good well organized event.

Finishing position: 8/25 (clubman E1)

Practice- 18th January 2009

I was looking for a place this week to get some bike time in and do a bit of practicing.
There was a couple of options open, one being the moto x track at Cheddar and the other at Rogershill raceway.

The plan was to travel up and meet Mark Tucker at one of the venues so we could both have a good day out riding and i would try my best to keep up with him!!!

Sods law then as on Saturday night And after us both doing a bit of homework, we found out that both practice sessions at both tracks had been cancelled, yes, you guessed it, because of the weather!
Luckily for me, Mark had a plan 'B'!

So come Sunday morning i set off for the drive up to Devon to the Tuckers residence. A quick coffee and a chat with Debbie and their son Richard (who'd just come back from riding in The Tough One!) and we set off for another drive to some private woods for some practice.

The weather had broken for us and we were greeted by lovely sunshine when we arrived.
With us being the only 2 there, we had the woods at our mercy.
Got changed, fired up the bikes and followed Mark around for a sighting lap.
A nice little course it was too, only about 3 miles long, but loads of roots, a couple of steep hills, some slippery fire roads, and a nice little water crossing thrown in as well.

That was it then, and the next time i saw him was after a couple of laps when he blasted past me in the woods on his RM 250 'Eddy' replica to lap me!! I did try to hang on to his tail pipe, but that only lasted for about 100 yds! (well he is in the champ/expert class, the bugger)

After a couple of hours on the bikes we called it a day and headed back for a coffee and a chat before i headed back home.

Thanks to Mark and Debbie for their hospitality and enjoyable day.

I seem to be on a bit of a 'crusade' at the moment and i hope to riding for the next 5 weeks consecutively! All over the place as well, Bloody mad or what?

Working party- 11th January 2009

With the first SW round coming up in a few weeks time down here in Cornwall, i went along with some members of Camel Vale mcc to help prepare the course.
It was nice to hear some stories from 'the old days' about past enduro's from the 2 'old stalwarts' Mike & John!! (alright, not so much of the old then).

No race at the moment next week but i'm hoping to find somewhere to ride.

Smeartharpe- 4th January 2009

I’ve now got a break from gigging for a few months so I can get some early nights on a Friday and Saturday, so hopefully I won’t wake up feeling knackerd when I go racing on a Sunday!

Not too bad a drive today as Honiton was only a couple of hours away. It was a cold and chilly morning again when I set off and the further I got towards Smeartharpe the more the temperature dropped. When I arrived the minus figure was showing on the temp gauge, -1, oh b*llocks, memories of the SCEC event at Somerley park a month ago came flooding back to me!!
Mind you, it was nice to have the luxury to park on concrete instead of being marooned in the middle of a muddy field!

Done all the necessary and went to line up for the sighting lap shortly afterwards. A big field it was too, all the clubman mixed in together, 2 & 4 stroke, big and small, and everybody keen to brave the cold snap and start the new year with decent run out.
It clear that when on the sighting lap that things were going to be very tricky indeed, with the rutted fields frozen and the roots in the woods being frozen as well. Parts of the course were ok and the MX track was fine, but the pieces of the course that were affected by the cold conditions were lethal (as I found out).

So onto the start itself then, I made quite a good one as we sped off round the MX track before going into a field that had the frozen ruts in it. I took it easy on these as both my wheels were sliding all over the place before we headed into the woods.
Now I don’t mind roots, that’s part of enduro’s, but when their frozen, that’s a different ball game, especially when your fully charged with adrenaline on your 1st lap! The wooded section was typical enduro stuff with some tight twists and turns, a couple of tricky steep hills, a long 3ft deep rut about 50 mtrs long running through the middle of it (that got deeper and deeper as the race went on) and a few rocks/ boulders that we had to go over thrown in for good measure. After this little lot, it was back out along a frozen concrete road, across some yet more frozen rutted fields and then finally returning to the MX track where you could open her up a bit and practice your jump skills!
A lot of variety and quite a good little course probably about 5-6 miles in length.

Trying not to go too mad and get used to the icy conditions I had a little ‘off’ as my front wheel just slid away from me on a frozen rut. I picked up the bike only to start swearing and cursing as I found out to my expense that I’d bloody well broke my clutch lever! 1st lap as well!
Luckily I wasn’t too far from the pits, so I crawled back in 1st gear and surveyed the damage. Sure enough I couldn’t continue so it was back to the van to fit a spare one.
After the re-fit it was back to the pits to drop my stuff back off, it was then that I noticed that some riders were already just coming in to finish their 2nd lap and I hadn’t even completed my first one yet, I went back out onto the MX track to complete my 1st lap stone bloody last out of the entire field!!!

Things picked up somewhat after that episode and even though the conditions weren’t getting much better I was going quite well and passing riders who were beginning to ‘flag’ due to tricky state of course which was harder work in the circumstances more than normal.
I did have another couple of little ‘offs’ but all at a very slow speed due to just slipping on the icy bits. I did manage to bend my clutch lever, good job it didn’t break again as I’d of been out of the race this time. Perhaps I should carry 2 lots of spares of everything!

After I pitted for fuel I nearly t-boned a guy across one of the fields who’d spun round like a doughnut and came straight across me. Luckily for both of us i just managed to skid past him and avoid a collision, could have been a nasty that one.

The last couple of laps I did see a lot of riders taking a breather in the woods as the course had taken it’s toll on a few of them. I didn’t feel too bad and kept on going to the finish at probably the same pace that I was at 2 hours earlier.

The last 3 out of 4 races have seen me wasting quite a bit of time due to various escapades that have gone on, and although I’ve been going well with the new bike, I am a bit ‘peed’ off as I could have some higher placings than what I’ve had.
Still, At least I’ve manage to get a finish in all of them so I’ll look on the bright side!

Finishing position: 22/50 (clubman)

Bike status: new clutch lever

End of year thoughts- 2008

Yes, It’s that time of the year again when I look back and reflect on what’s gone on in the last 12 months.

I say things as I see it and there’s no point in hiding anything away, weather that be good or bad, after all, in years to come when I look back on this blog and read about it, I want to know exactly what went on, ‘warts an all’!!!

So after spending the 1st year and a half in the bottom tier of racing, it was time to move onwards and upwards and try to better myself and make the short journey up to Clubman class for 2008.
Now then, if you’re a parent you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about when the saying ‘sleepless nights’ spring to mind! I’m not going to beat about the bush here, but being a dad for the 1st time seriously affected my racing! In fact, it bloody well effects everything!
When you’re used to being a ‘bit of a lad’ and the lifestyle that goes with it and you decide to start a family and have a ‘little un’, all hell brakes loose and it kind of takes over your life and everything falls by the wayside. Not easy to come to terms with I can tell you!

For that reason I only did a handful of races for the first 8 months of the year and consequently because I couldn’t do much running either through being knackered all the time, my fitness levels dropped rapidly. I’ve always been one for keeping in shape and this without a doubt has made up for the lack of biking skills in some races simply due to the fact that I’ve kept going when others have pulled out. So bearing that in mind, I wasn’t exactly in the right mind to do a lot of racing anyway.
When I did race I really struggled, up in class, not fit and knackered, not a good combination, not if you’re the wrong side of 40 anyway!

When things began to settle down a bit I decided to lay the TM to rest and try a different bike, so I treated myself to a new Gas Gas. A change is as good as a rest so they say and just as I fell in love with the TM (still got it) I’ve also fallen in love with the little gasser as well, and for the first time in my life, I’ve actually got a brand new motorbike, ‘lovely jubbly’ as Del would say!
I love riding it and if she gives me the same reliability as the previous bike, I’ll be over the moon.

My ‘season’ didn’t really start until October and I tried to cram as many events in until the end of the year as I could to get used to the new bike and to try and make up for lost ‘bike’ time. It was a bit of a shame that a few events towards the end of the year were cancelled as I would have done more riding.
One thing that always impresses me is the camaraderie and friendliness at enduro events. I’ve met an awful lot of decent folk again this year at the meetings and it’s always nice to have a chat to someone that you’ve parked next too in a field in the middle of nowhere and who you haven’t met before after traveling for 3 hours and strike up a conversation!!
You don’t get that at your local Tesco or Sainsbury’s do ya?

So into 2009 we go and I hope to ride as much as I possibly can concentrating on the SW champ rounds with some TnT and SCEC, Xmoor EC, as well as a few others for good measure.

Don’t forget, if you see us at a meeting, come up and say hello or nice words to that effect please!