Shillingstone forest- 28th June 2009

(pic by Whizzy)

It was an early start as I met up with Adam Blake & Nick Tremlett (who’d come along to watch for the day) for the drive up to near Blandford for SCEC event. With not much rain for the last couple of weeks I was guessing that we’d be having another dry event, and the weather again today was hot and humid, no sunshine to speak of, but still warm.
The conversation in the van on the way up was mostly from Nick and it soon turned out that he’s got his own catchphrase, this being ’What I need is’, that was repeated on countless occasions time and time again due to the subject he was talking about, this being members of the opposite sex which certainly kept me and Adam amused!!

So we arrived at Shillingstone and immediately clapped eyes on Andy Smith and Phil Harris (both of whom had made the trip up from our neck of the woods) and managed to get parked in front of um. This was no mean feat as the parking was bumper to bumper along the narrow forest roads. War was about to break out as the battle of the cc’s reared it’s head, me and Adam on the little 125’s, Andy and Phil both on 300’s, it was gonna be interesting to see how we all got on today.

Upon signing on I finally managed to catch up with Steve Jose who I’d hadn’t seen for a while. I’ve been talking to Steve in the week who’d been round the course helping SCEC to get it ready, so I had a bit of an insight as to what to expect and Steve told me that it suit me a lot more than lasts weeks TnT event as this course was nearly all woods, got to say Steve, you were spot on mate!

So it was off down to start to line up and get ready for the off and today I was in the clubman E1 class and got lined up next to ‘Boycey’ from the adrenaline trip forum.
As the flag dropped and In the words of Victor Meldrew himself ‘I don’t believe it’, I got the holeshot again! that’s 2 weeks running! As I got away from everybody like a bolt of lightning as we went into the woods after the short straight. Now then, this was so different from lasts weeks race as I kept a tight line through the wooded trails and ended up in front of everybody as I got back to the transponders after the 1st lap still in 1st place.

Now for the course itself and what an awesome venue this is and right up my street. Loads of flowing wooded trails, roots, off cambers, 2 massive hills to climb, some steep winding downhills, a couple of fire roads, some rutted grassy straights and a really tight section which meandered up and down that basically just been cut through the brambles which was littered with broken trees and branches and stumps making it really slippery even in the dry. Given you had the choice with some logs to jump over as well along the way, it was a decent track and about 8 or so miles in length.

So onto lap 2 and I was still in front when I came to one of those big logs which I confidently tried to go over instead of taking the easy route and going round it. Oh bollocks I thought as I promptly got stuck on it and with some of the E1 class right up behind me, they took the easy route and went round me as I had to get off the bike and push it in order to get over the damn thing, so I lost a few places in the process and ended up 5th or 6th before I got going again.
That’s the thing I’m starting to notice now, if you’re running near the front there’s not much room for errors coz as soon as you make a mistake and lose even a minute, someone will overtake you and you’ll lose a place or two, still it’s nice to be at the front rather than the back!
Coming back to the lap scoring and where the transponders were, SCEC amazingly had a big TV screen in full view so as you swiped your wristband through the electronic scoring box, your name, class and position would come up instantly on the screen.

After laps 3 and 4 I was holding 5th and I knew riders would pit before me so I’d be able to make up a place or two if I kept pushing as I don’t usually pit until later, and sure enough on the lap I went in to get some fuel, I’d made my way up to 3rd. Now the chase was on for the 2 guys in front of me!
I had a couple of ‘offs’ one straight after the other on the tight slippery bramble section which cost me a bit of time, nothing drastic, but annoying all the same and when that happens it tends to knock you off your rhythm a bit just when everything is going along nicely. With about 30 mins left I passed another rider in my class and had made it up to 2nd, now I really had ’red mist’ in my eyes as I knew I didn’t have much time to try and get the win, probably only a lap, but try as I might and having another ‘off’ due to colliding with a back marker whist overtaking, I didn’t quite manage it.
Caught up with Steve Jose at the end for chat and I’m glad he rode and got his TM out of
retirement for the day, he should do it more often!

Adam had a cracking result 3rd in experts (on his little katoosh) and 6th overall, so we all got back to the van happy including Nick who enjoyed watching, but come on Nick it’s time to get that bike out mate and start up again yourself and get amongst it! You know you want to.
Apart from Nick’s smelly feet and his soon to be famous catchphrase ’what I need is’, a decent laugh was had by us all on the 3hr drive home. In fact Nick, ’what you need is’, some bloody ‘Odor eaters’ to tame your feet!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Odor-Eaters-Insoles-Ultra-Comfort-Pr/dp/B001DZVEQ0

Finishing position: 2/20 (clubman E1)

Two valleys- 21st June 2009

So it was off up to near Dorchester for a Track n Trail event at Two valleys.

(pic by image consortium)

Now then, unfortunately for me I developed ‘caravanitis’ along the way on the A35 as I got stuck behind a load of the things!! As soon as I overtook one, I’d catch another one up 5 mins later, where did they all come from then? Perhaps they were just out this morning knowing that I was on the road and they wanted to see me fume as steam was blowing out of my ears and my temperature had risen to that of a furnace after constantly getting held up, not to mention some very rude words that were being used especially when following them along a straight dry road with good visibility at what seemed like a snails pace unable to overtake because more caravans were coming the other way!
Personally I think anyone over the age of 90 who wears black slip on shoes from Makro, wears a small knotted tie, a knitted jumper from Marks & Spencer, listens to Max Bygraves, tows a big white box on wheels, and is not a fan of ’Little Britain’ or ’Mock the week’ should be banned from driving, That’ll get rid of a few won’t it? Probably 99% of them!
Rant over, lets move on.

Nice weather again as I arrived rather late (you know why), in fact I only had about 15 mins before the sighting lap started, so there was no chance at all of doing that.
I expected to bump into a few people whilst I was there, but with time limited I was in a bit of a rush so didn’t really see anyone apart from a quick chat with Mark and Rich Tucker whilst I went to sign on.

Onto the start then and today was going to be a nice little test for me as I’d entered the Clubman 2st, which has no limitations on bike capacity, so I was against the bigger machines.
When the flag dropped I made an absolute flyer and got the holeshot!!!!! Bloody nora I thought to myself as I lead the clubman through the first couple of moto x style corners and out into the hillside.
I was crying out for the woods so I might be able to get away a bit as everyone might have got held up behind me, but there was no such luck as the course just kept on being a motocross track which meandered up and down the hillsides. After a couple of mins the bigger bikes began to blast past me and I lost several places, in fact more than several as I was nailing the little ‘gasser’ for all it’s worth and hanging onto the bars for dear life trying to keep up!

The track was bone hard, bumpy, and extremely fast with only a small wooded section that only took about 2 mins to ride through right at the end of the lap. There was a couple of hard routes dotted about, but these were very easy to ride through because it was so dry. If you could imagine a motocross track going up and down a couple of hillsides for 6-7 miles with a couple of fast straights on it, and a little bit of woods at the end, then that was it. Bit disappointing really as TnT usually have more woods in there events.
So with nothing technical and fast going, the battle for places would be extremely tight as I found out on my 3rd lap. Just before the end of the lap on that wooded section I give it too much ’welly’ and the back spun out on me, I did a doughnut and ended up on my ass facing the wrong way and even before I could get going again (maybe 30 secs) 4 riders in my class flew past me, that’s how tight it was going to be today, especially with the laps being only 13-14 mins long.
Mind you, you didn’t get held up too much as it was fairly open going and even when things got a bit tight, it wasn’t long before you were out into the open again, but trying to overtake a 250 or 450 on fast open going when you’re on a 125 ain’t easy, especially if they’re pinning it, even the back markers. It’s all down to braking and my front disc must have been glowing red like a F1 car with the amount of pressure I was putting on it!

Had a nasty moment about half way through when the front end twisted on me on a bumpy section and the bars turned round and dug right into my chest, but I managed to hold on and not ‘high side’ off the bike, thank god for the chest plate on my body armour.

I pitted at about 2hrs and was hoping for a quick stop, but sods law reared it’s head as some rider had abandoned his bike and parked it right in front of my re-fueling can. I couldn’t lean over to get it so I quickly asked someone to hand it to me so I didn’t need to get off the bike. Thanks for your help mate whoever you was, saved me a bit of time that.

I kept on pushing until the finish and the last couple of laps were really hard work as the bumpy track had taken it’s toll and I had a job to hold on to the bars, but I didn’t have anymore ‘offs’ and didn’t really waste much time anywhere so I was pleased with that.
Overall not too bad a result against the bigger bikes on a fast motocross style course and most of the riders being a lot younger than me!

Finishing position: 10/29 (clubman 2st)

Looking ahead

If anyones interested in going along to the BEC rnd 2 in Wales on July 11th/12th drop us a line coz i'm riding it and will be travelling up there in the van.
If you want to come along and see the top riders in action and maybe give us a hand as well or your riding and want to share costs, then let us know.

myenduros@aol.com

Norridge woods- 14th June 2009

Bloody hell, the suns out again and another sunny day greeted me as I made the drive up to Wiltshire for the next round of the Midwest series.
I was feeling a lot better this week as my right thigh is almost back to normal and I’ve managed to eat properly as well after that horrible bug, so I was looking forward to it.

The first 2 races of the series have not really been shall we say to my liking due to the fact that there’s been a lot of fields involved, so I was eager to see what this round was gonna be like.
Good news on the parking front anyway as there was plenty of room and it always makes a nice change to park up in field that’s dry!! Got signed on and the bike checked and went and put the fuel in the pits which was a cattle shed! Good idea that, especially if it were to rain.

So, with plenty of water drank beforehand (nearly 3 ltrs of the stuff) to get myself well hydrated, it was off to line up for the start. Things were going to be as tight as ‘the new laws on an MP’s expenditure list’ because just about 30 meters away after the start line, we all had to get through a farmers gate and go down a narrow lane, so a good start was important.

As the flag dropped I made a good one and was about 4th or 5th as we went down that lane and turned a right handed corner across a stoney road, then another right hander along another fast straight stoney track before we entered the woods.
I was still in the top 5 for the first couple of minutes when all of a sudden the bike started to cut out and then die on me. I knew what I’d done straight away, I FORGOT TO TURN MY PETROL ON!!!!!! What a plonker!!! Surely I’m not alone on this one am I? some of you must have that done before?
I ground to a halt and promptly turned the tap back on and started to kick furiously at the little gasser, but by this time and with it being so early after the start, the entire field of vets passed me. I continued to kick but she wouldn’t start, sods law that, and as I was kicking away I could hear the next group of riders coming towards me, and sure enough the whole field of the sportsman 2t passed me as well. What the f*ck is going on I thought as I knew it wouldn’t be long before the sportsman 4t were gonna be coming round the corner!
I quickly pushed the bike and leant it up against a tree, got on and kicked and kicked, but my thoughts had became true as the 4t’s went passed me as well before the gasser finally sparked into life.

So there I was, I’d made a good start and bloody well threw it all away and probably any chance of getting a decent result towards the championship. I was absolutely livid with myself, but me being me there was only one thing to do, and with still about 2hr 55mins left on the clock, I was going to push as hard as I can until the finish even though I’d have pass a bloody load of riders in order to get a decent finish.
I soon caught up with the sportsman 4t’s but with the wooded tails being so narrow, chances had to be taken in order to overtake, but I was on a mission and I gave it everything, I fact I gave it too much and came a cropper whilst getting ‘cross rutted’ trying to make up places, and guess what? I picked the bike up and she started 1st time!!!!!

With such a dry track and fast going it wasn’t until my 2nd lap that I passed a few of the sportsman 2t’s so I knew I was making progress but all I was interested in was trying to pass the vets in my class and I just couldn’t see any of them, they were well and truly gone.
Now then the course itself, this is going to be one of the shortest descriptions of any track I’ve raced! No hills, no bogs, no cambers, hardly any roots, no rocks, no water crossings, in fact it was just about 6-7 miles of wooded trails with a few ditches to cross and a couple of stoney straights thrown in along the side of a farmers field so you can have a blast, that’s it!
So nothing technical and extremely fast and dry.

After about an hour I’d managed to pass a few riders in my class, but seeing as there was a big entry in every group and with the course tight in a lot of places, it was hard at times to make any headway, and I still had to take a lot of risks in order to pass riders, but with last weeks race being difficult and slippery, today seemed a lot easier, and I was absolutely flying and felt really good.
With the weather being hot as well I knew riders would be flagging towards the end so I just kept pushing as hard as I could.

With about 2hrs up on the clock I made a lightning pit stop and went back out definitely ’on it’ and going as well as I’ve ever done. I still wasn’t sure how I was doing as I hadn’t overtaken that many that were in my class, but I just kept pushing and pushing hoping that the next person I caught up in front of me was in the number 300’s!! (that’s the vet’s class numbers)

At the end I just missed out on another lap by just over a minute, so effectively what happened earlier on had cost me, but unbelivabley I’d made my way up to 3rd in my class and only 12 secs behind 2nd place. I might have even snatched the win if I’d have turned the petrol on in the first place!

Given what happened today and the amount of riders I had to pass due to the nature of the course in order to get anywhere, I reckon that’s the best race I’ve done so far, and what’s even more pleasing is the fact that I stayed so strong until the end because after looking at the lap times I’ve noticed that my fastest lap was my penultimate lap.
Nice to catch up with Pete Boyles at the end of it all, so I had a decent chat with him and then headed for home on my ‘tod’ in the glorious weather, just as well as it was a 3hr drive home.

Finishing position: 3/27 (vets)

Nancemellion- 7th June 2009

First away, I got off to a flyer! no 22, white bike

(pic by Sue Pitman)

So with the next few weeks doing a bit of traveling all over the shop it was nice to have a race just 20 or so miles down the road. I have to admit (and so do a lot of other riders I’ve spoken too) that the Nancemellion course is not high on everybody’s ‘wish list’ as an event, but this was the 3rd round of the south west champs, so of course that in itself generates quite a few riders regardless.

The weather today was a bit overcast and slightly on the chilly side (if you’re a tin ribs like me!) but dry, and with the recent sunshine we’ve been having, it wasn’t going to be a wet one.
I got parked up along with the motley crew of Phil Harris, Andy Smith, Francis Banfield, Adam Blake, Steve Jose, Jed Treleaven, so a good bit of chat and banter was had before hand.
After doing all the necessary and taking the bike on what seemed like a mile down the hill to the start, we had to bloody well walk back up again and back to our vans to get changed and sort ourselves out.
The pits were situated on the side of a hill, none too clever that, but passable, unless you overbalanced of course whilst re-fuelling!

Onto the start itself then, a surprisingly small field for the clubman E1 class, only 12 of us, and as the flag dropped I got off to a flyer and was 1st away as we turned right up a loose gravel hill and into the woods.
I lost a place or 2 almost immediately as we entered those woods and was holding 3rd when I got caught out on a steep slippery little climb and lost another couple of places, but still a long way to go so I thought I could claw a place or two back later on.

Now the thing about this course and probably why not many riders actually like it is because it’s as rough and bumpy as hell and extremely tight in places, so tight in fact that if you were a trails rider you’d feel more at home than an enduro rider. Nevertheless it’s the same for everybody so you just had to get on with it and roll your sleeves up.
The woods themselves as mentioned were very very tight in a lot of places this also included some of the slippery rooty climbs, so in fact if a rider in front of you got stuck, basically you were buggered and you had to wait until the way up became free in order to get up it.
Don’t get me wrong, some of the wooded sections were a joy to ride and certainly a test of riding skills as there were some nasty little drop offs to get down which could have easily sent you over the bars or straight into the undergrowth.

After leaving the first 4-5 miles of woods we then went onto the old bumpy moto x track and up through to the hill just the other side of the valley which was covered in wet slippery grass! Yours truly took the wrong line on the very 1st lap on one of these grass covered hills and promptly got stuck half way up, and with the back wheel spinning like a washing machine on acid, I was going nowhere so I had to go back down and try again, this time with more success! I must have wasted a couple of minutes on that bloody grass and promptly lost some more places as well some of the other classes that started behind me passing me in the process.
After going up and down the open hill side a few times and through a couple of small bogs (or round them as it were) it was then back up a steep rooty (but dry) climb which led back up to the lap scoring. I reckon the whole lap being about 6 miles or so.

My 1st lap was awful, and as well as getting stuck on that wet grass I must have come off 5 or 6 times in the woods trying to maintain my decent start that I’d made, and every time I came off the more I kept shouting expletives to myself as the more I lost places, for some reason or another I just couldn’t get going, maybe it was my thigh or due to the fact that the bug earlier in the week that wiped me out had taken it’s toll and I hadn’t fully recovered I don’t know, but I just couldn’t find any sort of rhythm which was a bit disappointing as I’ve been riding quite well lately. Very frustrating!

A few more little annoying ‘offs’on laps 2 and 3 didn’t do me any good either and I was left with half a broken clutch lever to carry on the race with, luckily I could still use it and in any case with me being down in my class I didn’t have the time to replace it any way!

I think it was on lap 5 that a couple of spectators who were standing at the bottom of the climb just before the lap scoring pointed to me to take a different line up the hill to what I’d been taking before, so I followed there advice thinking something was up with my normal route that I’d been using. Oh b*llocks, why did I listen to them was my thoughts as I promptly came to a grinding halt half way up! Thanks to Mike Roose who was standing there and helped me shunt my bike over to the side to what I’ve been using all the race and with no problem got me on my way again with a bit of a push.
After this lap I pitted for fuel and let some air out of the rear so as to get some more grip and from then on things went a lot better even though we were 2 hours into the race!

Apart from the chain coming off (what again, that’s 2 races running now) because of a thick root that stuck up in the air like a sore thumb, I didn’t have too many problems from there on in until the finish, in fact for the last hour I actually was starting to enjoy it and finally starting to ride with a bit of urgency and I actually made up a few places which was pleasing.
One of the bogs claimed a bike as when I was on my final lap, I went past it and it was bolt upright stuck firmly in the middle of the gloopy mess helplessly waiting for someone or something to tow it out!

So after finishing and getting changed and having a chat with the lads we decided to go and get the obligatory burger, only to find that the catering van had p*ssed off home! So it was all down to Macdondalds at Fraddon on the way back to satisfy our empty stomachs. Adam, Steve, Andy, Fran, Phil (another DNF for him) and me all went for the nosh up and had a bit of a laugh at the same time.

Just one thing I’d like to mention, Adam Blake got accused of ‘course cutting’ today. Now anyone that knows Adam will tell you that that is total bullshit, infact at todays race Adam even stopped and helped an injured rider by redirecting the bikes around the injured person, does that sound like someone who would cheat? and this is a rider who is currently of the verge of being upgraded to the champ class next year. Fair play to him for doing that.
And guess what? The riders who accused him for course cutting were the riders who he beat today fair and square, sour grapes or what!!!

Finishing position: 6/12 (clubman E1)

A quick blast- 3rd June 2009

Decided to have a quick blast round the local moto x track tonight seeing as the weather is absoulutely cracking at the moment. I met Adam Blake and Nick Tremlett up there and all of us were on 125's, And believe or not the only other 2 riders there were on 125's as well!!! so it was happy days to hear the little smokers zinging around the track (like wasps in a can my dad used to say).
I didn't do too much and took it easy as i was quite literally 'flat out on my back' earlier in the week due to a horrendous bug that swept through the 'Muso' household late on Sunday night, but me being as keen as mustard i was eager to see if i could get some decent speed up and give myself a boost before sundays race and also test out my thigh thats been giving me trouble since that 'off' at Storridge wood the other week.
Me and Nick had a great race against each other for about 15 mins just before it was time to pack up because the track became a bit on the dangerous side due to the dust everywhere that was flying about and making it difficult to see, and as usual, we couldn't touch 'Blakey' as he was bloody well on a different planet showing us all how it should be done!

My thigh still isn't that good and i got woken up at 3.30am this morning and having to go and take more painkillers because it's still giving me trouble, still Sunday's race is a few more days away yet and another 200 anti inflammatory tablets between now and then should do the trick shouldn't it?

A busy month ahead so let's hope this leg doesn't cause me too many problems in the next few weeks.

June
7th Camborne & Reduth mcc
14th Midwest mcc
21st Track n trail
28th SCEC

It's all change- 31st May 2009

Yes that is my bike!

I felt like a change so i've kitted her out in spanking new white plastics all the way round!

I really don't know if i'm gonna stick any graphics on it yet, depends if i get bored with it or not looking like it's just come out of a box of PERSIL!

The gasser had a new piston in it this week, so it was on with the reg plate and i explored a bit of cornish countryside in the gorgeous weather to help run her in.

Going, Going, Gone!- 27th May 2009

Well it had to happen sooner or later.............................................................................
Today i finally said goodbye to my old TM. That's the bike that started it all for me in the 1st place and it finished 36 enduro's in a row for me!
Good luck to the new buyer and i hope she gives you as much satisfaction as i got from her.

Storridge wood- 25th May 2009

After missing the 1st round of the Xmoor series due to that little mishap with my radiator, I was so looking forward to riding this as you can guarantee that the club always puts on a good event.

After a short drive up to Bude to meet up with Steve Jose and Adam Blake, it was off to Storridge woods. With no map between us and no directions, we needn’t have worried because Adam was better than Google itself as he seem to know the way like the back of his hand as he took us through all sorts of lanes and back roads (which had me and Steve saying to each other, ‘where the f*ck are we?) to deliver us at the course with plenty of time to spare.

After signing on and taking a look at one of the Expert routes, we then had a bit of breakfast and sat on our backsides around the van chatting to riders that passed by waiting for the time to tick by to get changed for the 12’o’clock start.
The weather although overcast, was warm, and as the start time got nearer, we knew it was gonna be a hot one.

After warming our engines on the rather tight start line, it was time for the off, and as the flag dropped I didn’t particularly make a good one, and as we all bunched up around a tight right hander, the inevitable traffic jam occurred. Thankfully it didn’t last too long, but even so by the time I got going I was well down in the field and not happy!
We entered the woods immediately and were faced with some rooted tight tracks which made overtaken difficult especially as everyone was fired up with the adrenaline that goes with the early stages of a race. Some guy on KTM came hurtling passed me over to go over the bars seconds later as he hit a tree stump, I slowed to make sure he was alright as It looked nasty, but thankfully he was, so I carried on.

As we progressed through the woods I could see in the distance most of my riders in my class it what seemed like a procession following each other, and I could see I was well down the field so I instantly tried to make up some places, but it all went ’Pete Tong’ and that decision effectively put me out of the race.
As I tried to overtake a rider in front of me, my front wheel ‘washed’ out on a root and as I went down to the floor my handlebars twisted and stuck straight into my left thigh, OUCH!
At first I’d really thought I’d broken something, it was bloody agony, but after I got up, I managed to pick the bike up and lean it against a lovely friendly tree, which I also leant against to get my breath back. After a bit of rest and now with every other bugger passing me, clubman 4st, over 40’s, sportsman, I decided to try and ride around the rest of the course and make it back to the pits where I could check my leg over.
Saying that, with such a testing course, it wasn’t going to be a piece of cake, but I took it easy and got myself back and parked up.

I had to make some sort of decision now, pull out, carry on, or go and see the medics, but after 10 mins of rest and with a bit of stretching as well as taking a good look at it, I thought to myself that’s it’s gonna take a hell of a lot for me to DNF and today ain’t the day for that! As long as I could stand on the pegs I was willing to give it a go, so I bloody well did. Good job it wasn’t my right leg as I wouldn’t have been able to kick the bike over and start it.

Onto my 2nd lap I went then, albeit a bit slower than the norm, but I was determined to enjoy the event and take it easy and just get a finish, and with no pressure on I’d thought it would be a good idea to try all the expert routes out as well as I wasn’t worried about the time anymore after losing so much of it.
You know when it’s not going to be your day when about half way round your 2nd lap something else happens, and bugger me if it didn’t. I was going along nicely when all of a sudden the bike went ‘clunk’ and stopped dead in it’s tracks. I looked down only to find that the chain had come off and had wrapped itself around the front sprocket (been there done that before), so pushed it up to another one of those friendly trees, leant the bike against it and tried to unravel the thing. After about 5 mins I managed to free it just as a marshal came along so I flagged him down for a push to get the chain back on the sprocket and hey presto, away I went again.

The course itself was a classic, plenty of roots, a couple of rocky and rooty water crossings, off camber trails, some steep expert hills to try out, fire roads, logs to go over and more important, no flat fields! To be honest there wasn’t really anywhere you could take a breather as it was pretty much constant woods where you had to concentrate on riding most of the time, although at some points the trails only had one line and if you caught someone up and they didn’t move over for you, then it was hard work getting by, even at the pace I was going! Overall a superb lap and a long one, 10 miles or thereabouts and not for whimps!

With now more than half the race gone and me only on 2 laps I went into the pits and topped her up and went back out again. The previous laps I’d been doing the expert routes ok but this lap turned out to be a little different as I came off on one and promptly got my bike ridden over by a following rider which put a large dent in the exhaust (this definitely isn’t my day is it?).
On another one of the hard routes I got stuck near the top only to find Rob Ellick (snapped chain) and Paul Ford (tyre came off his rim) standing there, both of them had retired, so I had a quick chat with them and went back down, turned around and made it up next time. That hill was great fun pinning the little gasser all the way up it!

With about 30 mins left on the clock I pitted to rest my leg a bit and had a quick chat with Francis Banfield before setting off on what I knew would be my last lap. All I wanted was to take it easy and get to the finish and with thinking that I made a small mistake on an off camber part of the track and ended up trying to get the bike up a steep bank and back out onto the course. Try as I might I was stuck, so with looking round I realized that the only way to go was down. I rode the bike through the undergrowth downwards towards the fire road that I could see at the bottom, but when I got there I was faced a sheer drop back onto the fire road. No way could I get down that without going over the bars, so I got off the bike and let her drop over the edge! I clambered down, picked the bike back up and luckily for me nothing was broken so i kicked her into life, and off I went again to re-join the course, nice one!

So in the end and after an eventful race I made back to record a finish at the checkerd flag.
The riders I spoke to afterwards all thought it was an excellent event, Jason Duggan, Steve Jay, Andy Smith, Phil Harris, to name but a few. All I told them was my hard luck story, so they all got the violins out for me!
Was hoping to catch up with Pete Boyles afterwards but he’d retired as his TM splayed oil all over the rear disc, he’s not having much luck at the moment is Pete so let’s hope that changes for him.
I’ve mentioned this lad before, Richard Tucker, 18 yrs old and today 3rd in champ class! That lads getting bloody well faster every time I see him. Mind you apparently he learnt everything off his dad Mark (is that right Rich or not?).

A good bit of banter was had by us all in the van on the way home, which included being entertained by Steve ‘the man of a thousand stories’ Jose. I’m telling you now, if ever you’re bored after a race just listen to Steve as he’ll tell you all about what happened and at what particular time it happened, on what part of the course it happened, who it happened with and why it happened! Great stuff and well worth the diesel money on it’s own.
Well I suppose with things going so well lately I was due to have a crap race, let’s hope I don’t have too many of the buggers in the future.

Finishing position: 19/30 (clubman 2st)

Practice- 23rd May 2009

I was going to travel up and do the South Reading event today but decided not to as i've got to much to do at home this weekend!
Not to be outdone and having withdrawel syptoms about not riding my bike, i went for a bit of practice at a local moto x track. With the cracking weather being what it is at the moment, i rode round for just over an hour straight, before packing up and heading home for a Barbecue.

I've managed to get the van fixed after last weekend, so it's all systems go for the Xmoor event on monday.

West Harting Down- 17th May 2009

What a weekend it turned out to be! Talk about ups and downs!

So it was off up to West Sussex to enter a timecard event held by Croydon mcc, a round of the SEEC championship. Phil Harris entered it as well, so I picked him up along the way and we made our way to my sisters place near Newbury for an overnight stay so we didn’t have too far to travel in the morning for the race.

We arrived early Saturday evening and promptly went down the local pub called the Fox inn, where we set about having a decent bit of ‘nosh’ after the journey up. We got talking to a couple of locals (like you do), Rachael & Rick who had a sense of humor that was right up out street as it were, and we basically had a great time with them and laughed our nuts off until it was time to leave the place and head back to our lodgings for the night.
When we got back there I thought my sister and her husband were in bed, so we crept about quietly and decided to hit the sack. Bloody nora, sods law, I’d just got off to sleep when the front door went, it was my sister and hubby that had just arrived home and I‘d locked them out, I thought they were a kip! I finally managed to get to bed at 1am.

Morning came, and we were greeted by glorious bright sunshine, nice one! Apparently Phil didn’t hear the commotion last night and was dead to the world, so he got a good nights kip. We set off in good spirits and were looking forward to the day ahead, but as we got closer to Sussex, the sky darkened and we when we actually got to the venue, we were greeted by torrential rain. Now then, to be honest, it’s a bit shit getting your stuff ready and pushing the bike to scrutineering and signing on, but I love racing in the stuff because it makes even the simplest of tracks became tricky and slippery, so what I lack in bike skills, I make up for in fitness (that’s the plan anyway).

After getting stuck in the mud getting into the place, it took us about 15 mins to finally get the van up to the start area so we could park up. I reckon we tried at least 20 times to get up a small incline in the van before I had the bright idea to let the tyre pressures down on the front. That worked a treat and we finally made it.

On to the start then, and with the rain subsiding, me and Phil who were both on the same allotted time, set off into the woods. We were both entered in the clubman class, 2st & 4st and all sized machines, so I was looking forward to seeing how my little 125 would get on against the bigger bikes in the conditions.
I followed him for the first couple of miles which were all woodland type trails, then overtook him just before the special test where I waited for him. Not wanting to do the test 1st time around (you had choice when you wanted to do your 2 tests) I just said to him, ‘follow me and we’ll do the 1st one next lap’. From this point onwards, I didn’t see him again! More of that later.
The course was excellent, in fact, I’ll say it again, excellent. All woods and a few fire roads to have a blast on so you could open her up a bit. Not one flat field in sight, hooray!, thank god for that.

Due to the rain that had fallen the night before and in the morning, the hills were a bit slippery as was parts of the wooded trails and fitness was going to come into play as the race wore on, without a doubt. One ‘rooty’ hill in particular had about 7 or 8 marshals stood on it to help the riders up to the top, as it was extremely tricky indeed and hard going, but the little ‘gasser’ made it up there every time with lots of throttle and some slipping of the clutch. Boy oh boy, do I love 125’s!
The course had a bit of everything apart from a stinky black bog. There was rooty climbs and downhills, logs to go over, fast trails, fire road tracks, muddy sections and a decent fast special test. Overall i reckon the course was about 9-10 miles in length.

At the end of the 1st lap (they gave us 50 mins to do it) I made 10 mins, so i had a bit of a wait until I was due out on the next one, but Phil was nowhere insight, so I guess something had happened to him, but I couldn’t wait any longer as my time had elapsed and I was back out.
No problems on my 2nd lap and with 45 mins to do it in, I made time again and when I got back i put some fuel in. I did my 1st ‘special test’ this time and it went well.
Lap 3 and with 40 mins to do it in, I did my 2nd special test which went well and still made it back with a bit of time to spare albeit only a couple of mins. Still no sign of Phil!
Onto lap 4 then and this was the one that was going to sort everybody out as we only had 27 mins to complete it in. With the course getting rutted and cut up and the rain starting to fall again we were told that the event would be cut short by a lap because of the conditions. I made it back to the time check 8 mins over.
So on I went then to start my 5th and final lap, and with a relaxed 40 mins to complete it, I didn’t need to push to hard. It was at this point that I actually saw Phil as I went through the time check who explained to me that his throttle cable had snapped soon after I waited for him on the 1st lap, so in fact he’d only been riding for about 10 mins or so.
It was on this lap that I managed to have a few little ‘offs’, I wasn’t tired at all, but simply trying to maintain my pace, but with the course getting more difficult, it caught me out a few times. One little ‘off’ (like a 10 mph job) into a tree is all it takes to break something on your bike and that’s exactly what happened, oh well, looks like another new headlight surround and mudgaurd again for me!!!
Apart from that, I was pleased to finish with quite a bit of energy left, so I would have gone on for another lap no problem, shame the clerk of the course cut the event short! Apparently a lot of riders had pulled out because they found it too hard?

So it was back to the van to meet up with Phil so he could tell me about his hard luck story and we left for the 4 hour drive home.
Whilst getting out of the place the rutted muddy tracks that people had driven over in the rain needed a ’run up’ in order to get through them and make it up the small hill out of the place, we made it no problem but coming down the other side my van ’grounded’ itself at the front, and with a big ‘clunk’ sound where she’d scraped along the deck, we thought it would be best to stop and check things. It was at this point that the oil light came on the dashboard and as I looked down outside the window, all I could see was a puddle of oil!!! Oh b*llocks, my sumps been trashed (see pic). With that we got out and inspected the damage and sure enough, a whole full of engine oil had deposited itself onto the floor and there was no way we were going to make it back home.

Luckily Phil had the full monty RAC cover, so after getting a lift up the road in order to get a phone signal on the mobile, he asked them to send a low loader to put the van on so we could get home. As riders passed by us on their way home, some stopped to ask if they could help and a few of them gave us some food and drink to keep us going until help arrived. It’s pleasing to know that one someone gets in the sh*t, a lot of people that have been at the event are willing to lend a hand even though they just want get home after a hard days riding. A big thanks to everybody who stopped and a lot can be said for the camaraderie of enduro riders.
About 1 ½ hours later the RAC turned up but with a plain transit van! How the hell is that going to tow us home then? Apparently not said the technician, he’d just come to look at it and report the problem. Great, so we’ve told you we want a low loader and told you what’s up and you just send someone out to look at it we told the RAC. Not impressed!
The guy was only there 5 minutes and off he went. So now we had to wait again for a tow truck and now that everyone had left the event and gone home, we were definitely on our own in the middle of nowhere in West Sussex.

Another 1 ½ hours had past before another breakdown truck arrived and still it wasn’t a low loader!!! What’s going on now then? All we were doing was getting towed back to Chichester where we were to pick up a hired car to get us home and the van would be brought back the next day. Fair enough, but we had to pay our own way home and fill the car up with petrol and we couldn’t claim it back. Phil wasn’t happy and he’d every right not to be, he’d payed for the premium service which means the RAC will get you home for nothing and you’re expected to end up paying.
Thankfully and after about another 4 -5 phone calls it all got sorted and the RAC at last saw some sense and would send out a low loader to put the van on so we could get home. I hadn’t eating for 11 hours and so we got the recovery truck to tow us to the local burger king so we could have a right old feast! Another 1 ½ hours past by before we finally got going on a low loader to be taken down to Wincanton for yet another 30 minute wait and then to be transferred to yet another low loader who was going to take us home.
Phil (the lightweight) kipped for most of the way, I dunno, these youngsters, can’t seem to keep the pace up can they? And he had a decent nights sleep the night before! Luckily for me both the drivers were good lads, one being a football fan, and the other one a bit of a biker, so a good bit of conversation went on to pass the time away.

We got dropped off at Phil’s place and then he gave me a lift home and I walked through the door at 4am.
I’m not going to forget that weekend in a hurry then am I?

Finishing position: 9/45 (clubman)

Best wishes

This time it goes to Jack Twentyman who had a crash at Kings Hill (see blog 26th April).
After a couple of weeks and still in pain due to the accident, Jack finally went to the hospital to get checked out, and things turned out to be a lot more serious than he first thought.

The x rays had showed that he has broke a couple of vertebrae in his back and will be out of racing for sometime due to the nature of the injury. I spoke to Jack earlier in the week and in his own words he told me that he was lucky and it could have been at lot more serious as he had landed on his head after going over the bars.

As i write this he's been admitted to hospital and waiting for a CT scan and to see the specialist who will then decide on what treatment there will be.

All the best mate and hope to see you soon.

Pratice- 13th May 2009

Went out for a bit of practice tonight for an hour or so with Nick Tremlett and Adam Blake around a local moto x track. Me and Nick had a good little battle together but couldn't get anywhere near Blakey as he was absolutely flying.
Good thing about going along with a few lads is that you can swap bikes, and tonight i went on a YZ 125, not as crisp in power as the gasser, but i reckon it had a little bit more top end than mine.

Nice to have a ride around mid week, must do it more often!

Chevenage- 10th May 2009

A cracking beautiful sunny day greeted me as I made the drive up to Chevanage for a round of the Midwest series.

Now then, I did a previous race at this place not so long ago and wasn’t really impressed with it due to the sheer numbers of riders involved on the course, and today was much the same judging by the look of the size of the entry. But you pays your money and you takes your chance and having a ride out is better than not having one.
I didn’t start off too well when I realized I’d left my ORPA license at home, and even though I got Marie to text me my license number to me, Midwest were having none of it, so I had to pay for a day license, £5!! Even though they’ve already seen it when I entered the 1st race with them.
Another club Track n Trail take one look at your license only once to make sure you’ve got one and then you don’t have to show it again for the rest of the year. And even if you did need a day license with them, it ain’t a fiver. Ok, all clubs work differently and it was stated on the final instructions that you had to show your license, so it’s my fault I forgot the thing in the first place!
I’m starting to think about this whole Midwest series already and it’s only the 2nd race into it, they are the dearest club I’ve joined, one of the dearest races to enter, and probably the dearest if you need a ORPA day license, um……………………….

Onto the start itself and I managed to have a very quick chat with Pete Boyles who was riding a TM 250 this time out before we got going. When the flag dropped I hurtled it into the first corner, and with 40 or more bikes in my class I reckon I was in the top 10 as we meandered out way round a hilly field set out in moto x style before we entered the woods. The course this time was being run in reverse with some changes made to it, a good idea that I thought.

As with the 1st round and with so many bikes entered we soon caught up the back of the clubman 4st and with the woods being so tight, the inevitable queue of bikes began to appear in front of you which held you up a bit as there was no where to pass and with it being the 1st lap every ones pumped full of adrenaline so you ain’t going to get anyone to let you through are ya?
All the same, the woods were are a treat to ride through, nothing too technical, a few roots here and there, some nice off cambers and a couple of short steep hills thrown in for good measure, one of which was the hard route option, but I cleared it each time (apart from the last lap, more later) so no problems there.

In between each wooded section came of course fields, and more fields! Basically I was pinning the little ‘gasser’ for all it’s worth across these as there was no way I’d be able to compete with the bigger bikes on pure speed alone if I wanted to get by anyone. I knew though that as the race wore on and with people slowing up, it would be much easier to get by and out brake them on the fast open sections. I’m not a great lover of fields, it just seems to be ’who can hold the throttle open the longest’, I don’t mind a couple thrown so you can have a blast, but Chevenage seems to have more than it’s fair share of them!
About ¾ of the way round was that little water crossing which as every lap went by, got more difficult to get through as big ruts were forming on the other side of it as some machines had ‘dug’ themselves in when getting stuck. I really didn’t have any problems with it, but I passed a few riders who were finding things a little bit difficult and digging themselves in a big hole.
With the conditions today being so dry, the 6-7 mile lap was fast and it just depended on how quick you could pass riders in the woods as there wasn’t anything technical to hold anyone up, so it was sods law if you got caught up behind a gaggle of bikes or not, some laps you were lucky, some laps you weren’t!!

For the first hour I exchanged a few places with some riders in my class, but I figured I was about where I started in the beginning and wasn’t really making any ground up on anyone, so at that stage a top 10 finish was all I could hope for.
Things began to ‘thin’ out a bit on the course later on and it was joy to ride properly through the woods without the traffic problems. I pitted just after 2 hours and yet again was cutting it fine as I had to stick her on reserve in order to make it back to the pits, PHEW! Relief or what, as I made it back just before she run bone dry. Seems to me I’m cutting this re-fueling lark at bit close every time. Time for me I think to get told off and write some lines like you did at school (do kids still do that I wonder)? I must re-fuel earlier, 100 times!

Back out I went then and rode round without a hiccup until the last lap board was shown as we passed through lap scoring. It was on this lap that I got caught up in a pile up on the hard route going up a hill. I’d done it all the race without any problems and bloody well ‘sod’s’ law 2 bikes came down in front of me as we were going up it. My bike got pinned against a tree and I couldn’t move it, even after all the heaving and the pinning of the throttle, she just wouldn’t budge. Luckily for me a young lad who was a spectator came to my rescue, and we managed to get the bike out and turn it around so I could go back down and carry on again, albeit via the easy route as the hard one was now clogged up. While I had been stuck I noticed 1 or if not 2 of the riders in my class went past me, that pissed me off no end and I tried to close the gap on them for the remainder of the lap, but the checkered flag came to soon, and now I can see I lost a couple of places losing the 2-3 minutes due to that bloody pile up. Just goes to show how the racing can be so tight some times even in a 3 hour race, especially with a big entry.

Not a bad days racing, and it makes a change to drive home in some decent weather as the shine was still shining.

Finishing position: 5/42 (vets)

Training- 2nd May 2009

With me not being able to race this weekend due to work commitments, i put on the running shoes and went out for a run in order to keep my fitness and stamina levels up.
I covered the half marathon distance of 13 miles (brings back memories does that!) so it was a good test of endurance. Nice day with beautiful sunshine so took it easy. although i must admit to being a bit 'cream crackered' for the last few miles.

Kings hill- 26th April 2009

Yellow top and helmet? Thought I was due for a bit of change!

It was an early start as I set off to pick up Phil (Harris) along the way for our 3 ½ hour journey up to Salisbury to do the TnT event.
The weather wasn’t looking too kind down this way as I drove through torrential rain on the A38 and then some of the way on the A303, but thankfully it cleared and the sun came out.

(pics by Brewbs & Debbie Tucker)

Phil decided to have a kip in the van along the way, and when he woke up, I thought I’d do the same and try and grab a bit of shut eye so I wasn’t too ‘cream crackerd’ before racing, so he took over driving. I ‘d only been a kip for about 10 mins when bloody nora the mobile rang and woke me up! Typical that, just when you don’t want your girlfriend to ring ya, she bloody well does. I wish I wouldn’t have left that soppy ‘see you later’ note for her now on the side as she was returning the compliment, (good job she knew I didn’t mean it)!!!
Anyway, couldn’t get back to sleep after that, so me and Phil started chatting like pair of old women totally oblivious to where we were actually going. It was when we went past Stonehenge that I suddenly thought, where the f**k are we, what we doing here? Like a pair of headless chickens we’d gone miles out of our way, so we had to turn back and take another route, in the end we finally arrived at Kings hill, it had taken us over 4 hours. All we could do was laugh about it, good job we had plenty of time in hand otherwise I think the air would have turned blue with some colorful language!

After a bacon roll which Phil had kindly donated to me, it was off to sign on and get the bike checked. I bumped into Richard Batstone who I’d haven’t seen for a while, good to see him back racing after a lay off. Also had a chat with Paul Ford, Rob Ellick, Mark, Rich, Debbie Tucker and Jason Duggan. Got back to the van and met up with Jack (twentyman) who’d also traveled up from our neck of the woods with his boy Paddy.

After missing out on the sighting lap it was down to the start to wait for the flag to drop. A full entry, so every class had some decent racing to fight amongst themselves to get a result.
Off we went when, not a bad start and in the top 10 as we meandered our way round a flat field laid out in moto x fashion to sort everybody out before entering the woods. There were 3 hard routes to have a go at if you fancied saving a bit of time, so instead of usually avoiding them, I’d thought I’d have a go at all 3. The 1st was an extremely short sharp hill, in fact it was so steep there was no way that you could even walk up the bloody thing! I give it go, but as I got near to the top, the bike flipped out on me and I was sent tumbling back down again with the bike stuck half way down in some bushes. Oh dear (well, words to that effect) I thought, 1st lap and I’m gonna lose time already! It took me a good few minutes to drag the bike back down out of the bushes and get going again, and I could see that most of the clubman were going past.
After another short stint of easy woods and a couple of tracks that went round the outside of a few fields, then it was onto another hard route option which was a muddy water crossing. Speaking to Mark Tucker earlier who’d done the sighting lap, he told me to go to the right or left of it as there was a big hole in the middle, so what do I do? Like a prat I didn’t think and promptly got stuck in a big muddy hole because I ended up going in the middle of it! I pinned it and hoped for the best, but the back wheel just dug in deeper and deeper. I was just at the stage when you think to yourself that you’ve got to get off and try and heave the bike out when I gave it one last go, bingo! The little gasser shunted it’s way out and up the slimy muddy bank I went and onto safety, relief or what!
Of course it was more time wasted and this was only the 1st lap, not good.

The 3rd hard route wasn’t a problem, just a steep hill and not as bad as the first one, so I had no trouble on that one at all.
Part of the course involved traveling along a small river, I reckon a couple hundred yards long, not once, but twice on the same lap, good job there wasn’t much rain before hand as me thinks that it could have caused some problems. As it was, it wasn’t too deep and you only got your feet wet.
Some of the tracks that we went around the outside of the fields were very stony and following another rider sometimes became a nightmare as small rocks were just being thrown up in your face all the time as you were trying to find a line to overtake. Due to this and with poor vision, I once overcooked it on a long fast straight and promptly shot through the track tape ending up in the middle of a field, whoops!
A cracking part of the course I thought was 3 log jumps one after the other, get those wrong and you were over the bars no problem. A small flat moto x style section finished off the lap. The wooded sections weren’t a problem at all, just nice flowing trails really and I reckon the whole thing being 5-6 miles in length and quite a fast lap I thought.

So after an eventful 1st lap (and now looking through the lap data) and with my ’off’ and getting stuck as well, I was down to 20th. I knew things to could only get better and they did as I got into a rhythm and started to ride well again. I did the hard routes (apart from that 1st extreme hill) on every lap and sailed through them no with problems.
I pitted after about 2 hours, good job I did as the tank was nearly bone dry (thank god I didn’t run out of fuel again), changed my goggles, then back out I went.
No real drama to report although I just missed out on a coming together with another rider as we both played ‘chicken’ trying to out brake each other at the end of a fast straight going into a corner.
Got held up a few times behind riders in the woods, but that’s understandable as sometimes there was just nowhere to pull in and let you pass, and with it being a full entry, you’re simply not going to get a clear track for 3 hours or more are you? Still, nowhere near as bad at the Midwest mcc races!
I went onto finish but annoyingly missed out on another lap by 2 mins, just goes to show, a few mins of wasted time early on in the race has a knock on effect.

At the end of the race when I got back to the van I found Phil’s bike already in the back with all his gear packed away and he was nowhere in sight. I just thought he might have gone for another burger or was watching the racing somwhere, but with 10 mins or more gone by and with no sign of him, I though it’ll best to give him a ring. I had an answerphone message from him to say that he’d retired from mechanical failure and also that Jack Twentyman had been involved in a big ‘off’ on one of those log jumps and he was driving him to hospital!
In the end Jack being as ‘tough as old boots’ just wanted to get home so it was best that Phil drove him back just in case, so I was left with a 3 ½ hour drive all on my Todd.
Turns out that Jack’s ok and is just a bit bruised and sore.

Overall I’m pleased to have got a decent enough finish seeing as I was so far down after the 1st lap.

Finishing position: 8/30 (clubman 2st)

Plans for May:

10th Midwest mcc

17th Croydon mcc

23rd South reading mcc

25th Exmoor enduro club

Best wishes

Best wishes to Paul Fordy who had a high speed accident last Sunday during the Hustyns event.
Paul got knocked unconcious and also broke his collarbone and is about to go into hospital to have it pinned.
We wish him all the best and hope he gets back racing again soon.

Hustyns- 19th April 2009

(pic by Debbie Tucker)

I was really looking forward to this, it’s just 10 mins up the road, we had cracking weather, it was a timecard event and I seem to be riding quite well at the moment.

Funnily enough all of us that had been traveling to the SCEC and TnT events lately managed to arrive at the same time and park up next to each other. Adam Blake, Steve Jose, Jack twenty man, Andy (daddy) Smith, and Phil Harris, so a good bit of banter was had by all of us. I think Steve took the brunt of it as he can’t seem to find a way to plant the front end of his bike properly into the corners, funny that, I’d thought he’d be good at planting things seeing as he’s a landscape gardener! (poor joke that I know).
Being over 2 early hours early before the race started, I had plenty of time to chat to everyone I laid my eyes on. Debbie tucker (armed with her new camera), Arthur Jonhson, Jed Treleaven, Ben Tyrell, Francis Banfield, Ritchie Tucker, Trevor Pengelley, Paddy, Tim Williams, plus numerous others at different times for which there was so many I just can’t remember everybodys name!

Done all the necessary and just about as the sun was about to shine it’s way through the trees, we set off as per usual for a timecard event in groups of 4.
The course this year was a different layout to that of previous years and I thought a little shorter, maybe 8 miles in length?
As usual being a Camel Vale event, an excellent enduro course was on offering. Wooded trails, plenty of roots, off cambers, hills, water crossings, etc, etc.The special test was a long one, excellent as well with a flat out fire road, a slippery climb, some real tight stuff, loads of roots, wooded trails, in fact compared to last weeks test is was really hard work to keep ‘on it’ for the duration as this one took me just over 8 mins to complete compared with that one at Bagshot which was 1min 45 seconds!!!

With the times being a bit slacker this year most riders stayed on time so we all knew that the results were going to be all about the special test times. I kept reminding myself to stay on the bike when on the test and try to ride smoothly and not get carried away. The 1st one went well, the second one was faster even though I caught up one of the riders in front of me and came off trying to overtake him. My 3rd and final test was faster still, I felt I’d rode well in all 3 tests, so was happy with that.

With quite a bit of time to spare on each lap there was no need to take any risks, so I concentrated on just getting round and trying not to brake anything! There was an extremely long fire road on a part of the course of about a mile or so long where you could have literally nailed it in top gear (as a few riders did), but I didn’t bother as there was no need too.
I stayed on time for all 6 laps and felt really fresh at the end of it all. I suppose in a way that I would have liked it to pee down with rain for a whole week before so the going would have been a bit tougher! But hey, lets not moan about the sunshine eh?

Phil had to retire (the softie) because he’d come off and hurt his leg, or that’s what he told us anyway, and Christmas came early for me and Steve because ‘Blakey’ bought us a cheeseburger at the end as well.
So a good day was had by all and I had my best result since coming up into the ranks of the clubman.

Finishing position: 2/16 (clubman E1)

Bagshot- 12th April 2009

( pic by Rabie)


So it was a few days away to visit my family and friends up in Reading, and I couldn’t think of a better way to spend a Sunday whilst I was up there, other than do an enduro that was just down the road in Bagshot!

My mate Ade who lives up that way and who I’ve known for years came along for a day out with us and to give us a hand and generally reminisce about the old days when we used to hang about together and get up to all sorts!

An overcast day, but not too chilly and conditions just about right for this timecard event held by Surrey constabulary. For some strange reason and with the event being held on private land, the organizers were checking the lights on the bikes and to make sure that they were in working order. I failed the bike check, my back light wasn’t working so I had a choice, get a 60 second penalty or get it sorted! Luckily for me it was just a loose connection so no problem there.

The event itself would be in stages, reason being that you had to do mutli laps in order to complete 1 stage and so on. All together there would be 6 stages ranging from 2 laps, 3 laps, and an incredible final lap of just 1 lap that given the time we had to do it in, you’d have thought that someone like ‘Knighter’ had set the time for it!
We also had 2 special tests mixed in for good measure as well.

On to the start then and as usual with a timecard, we set in groups of 4. First off a lovely fire road to get your bike warmed up a bit with huge puddles to negotiate to before we entered the woods themselves. The trials were excellent and in great condition, absolutely perfect riding terrain and even the couple of steep hills we went up didn’t cause any problems as there was plenty of grip to be found. Some of the woods were tight in places (as you’d expect) and about half way there was the inevitable ‘bit of a bog’, and even on the 1st lap I came across riders that had got stuck in it with the back wheel firmly planted in the stuff and going nowhere (they later cut this bit of the course out). A few more fire roads linked yet more woods with some tight hilly nadgery bits before we went back through a flat wooded section to complete the lap. I’d say about 7ish miles in length.

An excellent course and right up my street, not a flat field in sight, so not just a case of pinning back the throttle to see how fast you can go across a bit of grass. My only concern was that parts of the track in the woods weren’t marked up very well (later on to be my downfall) as sometimes when you got to the end of a trail and there would be other tracks branching off left or right with no arrows anywhere.
Things were going ok until stage 2 when I did a loop in the woods for about 10 mins and ended up back behind some riders that I’d already overtaken some 10 mins earlier! Because of the lack of arrows I’d mistakenly done the same bit twice and I was bloody well livid to say the least. When I finally got back to the pits, I ended up being 15 mins down on time. I was gutted as I was going really well and had high hopes of a decent finish. I spoke to a few other riders whilst I was waiting to go back out and I wasn’t the only one who’d lost time time because of the lack of marking and in fact, someone else had lost 9 mins because of it too. I did mention it to the marshals at the time check and things seem to improve on that section of the course and indeed others as the race went on, maybe it wasn’t just me that complained.

The next lap I did my 1st special test and promptly came off on the ever so tight little test section due to me being well pissed off about what had happened earlier and trying much too hard to make up for lost time.
With me being 15 mins behind now on time I got my head together and stayed on time on every stage until the last one which was virtually impossible to keep to. I think everyone lost a bit on that stage as well. I had a better 2nd test as I’d calmed down at bit by the time that came round again and I was going so well that at one point I had 20 mins to spare on one of the stages until I went back out again!

A but gutted really as the results show that I would have finished 4th if it were not for the lack of course markings. I mean lets be honest about it, I did the Muntjac a few months back with a 22 mile lap and I didn’t get lost on that did I? Enough said. (or am I going blind in my old age)

Big thanks to Ade for helping us out, he was there waiting to give us a hand in the pits after every lap and also had to listen to me shouting expletives when things went all ‘Pete Tong’.

Finishing position: 14/42 (clubman)

Working party- 5th April 2009

Yes it was back out again this morning after yesterdays practice, but this time no bikes involved!
With the SW champs coming up soon, clerk of the course Mike Roose had assembeld his army, and we were ready to do battle!
So fully equipped with our armoury, we set about clearing the track in readiness for the event in a couple of weeks time.
A good turn out today, and nice to have a chat to a few riders who i haven't seen for a while.

Practice- 4th April 2009

Want your rear tyre ripped to shreds? No problem, just contact Steve Jose, he’ll do it for ya! (see pic)

So with the Wadebridge moto x track open for practice and just 2 minutes up the road, it was a day out for a blast around the place with Adam Blake and Steve Jose.
With me still having the old TM, I took that as well as the gasser, just to see how she went and to give her a quick blow out.

With 3 of us all there together and 4 bikes, TM 125, Gasser 125, KTM 125, Gasser 250, we all had a bloody good swap around to see how the others rode. Steve managed to kill Adam’s back tyre completely when he got on his bike and then decided it would be a good idea to rip it to pieces and ride around with the mouse hanging out!
Not to fear as luckily I’d bought a spare tyre with me, so10 mins later it was all hunky dory and a certain ‘Blakey’ was happy again.

I was nicely surprised after having a go on Adam’s ‘Katosh’ 125 xc. Quite smooth power for crosser and set up really nice as well. Not really that far away from my gasser, both very similar after trying out one after the other, and with it being a 125, I knew exactly where I was with it.

I’m trying to find words to explain Steve’s Gas Gas EC 250! Lets just say it’s got more ‘grunt’ than a german porn star. The thing pulls out of any corner in what seemed like any gear! I was stupidly going round some slow parts of the track in 4th, opening it up, and she just pulled right from the bottom all the way up and didn’t miss a beat before it took off. Bloody nora, surely that thing could climb a mountain couldn’t it? And this is a 2 stroke I’m talking about here!
I should be riding one of these at my age, but funnily enough, I still love the 125’s, you have to work much harder, keep on the revs and be commited most of time to get the best out of um, so for the time being and just like my old man used to say, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’.

When Steve got on my little ‘gasser’ I had a job getting it back off him, He wanted one!
It got to stage where I thought he was going to run out of fuel he did so many laps on it.
A good day was had by all, and it made welcome change to try other bikes without the added pressure of racing.

Combe sydenham- 29th March 2009

Oh dear, after putting my bike in the van and driving up to Bude to meet up with Adam Blake and Steve Jose to go to Combe Sydenham, I opened the van door when I arrived and looked in horror as a load of coolant had deposited itself onto the floor of the transit! (see pic)
It was peeing out faster than a Peter Lorimer shot (for those of you who don’t know who Peter Lorimer is, just google him). I mean, there’s only so much you can do at 7’o’clock on a Sunday morning as regards to working on the bike isn’t there? We all took a look at the offending radiator and basically there was nothing we could do, so regrettably I had to make the decision not to ride but to travel up anyway, watch the race and help a few riders out in the pits as well.

I know exactly where the problem came from with the bike. Yesterday (Saturday) I decided to straighten out the brackets on the rad due to having a few ‘offs’ which had bent them. After doing that and a few other bits and bobs, I put the bike away for the day all ready and prep’d for the race. Obviously the core of the rad been damaged in some way and with me bending things around a bit I managed to create a split somewhere along the line. Never mind, shouldn’t have so many ‘offs’ should I, then I wouldn’t bend anything!
Looks like I’ll need a new rad and I’m also getting some rad braces as well, that should stop um bending!

After getting to Combe sydenham surprisingly in one piece due to the fact that Steve was trying out how fast his ‘sprinter’ can go by ‘flooring’ it, we were greeted by a glorious sunny day, in fact it’s the driest I’ve seen the place in years!

With loads of time on my hands I had quick walk around to see who was about and basically turned myself into a right old ‘Hilda Ogden’ chatting to just about everybody I laid my eyes on due to the fact that I didn’t have to rush about getting ready for a race.
Now for the name dropping, chatted with Robert Ellick, Paul Ford (we chatted about ‘new borns’ and the lack of sleep you get when they arrive), yes Paul, I was there last year with that, know exactly how it feels mate!, Andy Smith, Phil Harris, Debbie Tucker, Jack Twentyman, Rich Tucker, Jason Duggan, Paul Cowshall, Pete Boyles, Matt Hamley, Mark Tucker, Arthur Johnson, probably a few others as well, but can’t remember everyone’s names!

Soon after the riders went up to start Andy Smith came ‘freewheeling’ it back down to the pit area where I was standing, ‘Trev, qick, my chains broke’, oh b*llocks as a blind panic ensued as we tried to get another chain for Andy. Luckily a youth rider who’d raced earlier in the day lent us one and once we fitted it, Andy got to race, albeit some 15mins late.

Enjoyed watching the riders come through as it were ‘being on the other side of the fence’, but there ain’t nothing like riding, and I was a wee bit jealous not being out there, but I suppose at least it did give me a chance to see some of my rivals going round.
A couple of laps in and Racersedge (Paul Cowshall) came crawling back with a rear wheel puncture, we both went running about all over the place to try and get a tube for him, but no luck there, so Paul called it a day and retired.

I helped quite a few riders pit at about half way, Jack (twentyman) being a champ rider was like a man possessed when he came into the pits! All I heard from him was, ‘quick, hurry up’ then it was ‘new goggles, put them on’, that was basically about it as I refuelled him. Mind you I can’t blame him, he was lying 4th at the time and only a couple of mins behind the leader so every second counts when you’re at that level.

Steve Jose came in to re-fuel and wanted a chat! I told him to get his arse in gear and stop talking and to get on with it. Next time I help him I’ll bring a picnic table, sandwiches, flask, and a portable dvd player so he can watch a film or two if he wants!

I didn’t venture too far away from the pit area all day just in case someone needed some help somewhere along the line, and that certainly was the case as I helped riders I didn’t even know sort a few things out. Perhaps I should join the Samaritans!

With a few minutes left on the clock Andy Smith came past the transponder area where I was standing, ‘come on, last lap’ I shouted, but his luck had finally run out as I looked down only to see that his back tyre had disintegrated and was hanging off the rim. Not Andy’s day then, first of all the chain, now his tyre.

Well, I did have a good day and was kept busy for most of it, so enjoyed it. Not as good as riding, but being where the action is and lending a hand is much better than standing there for 3 hours with your hands in your pockets playing ’marbles’!

Plans this month:

4th Practice

12th Surrey constabulary enduro

19th Camel Vale mcc

26th Track n Trail

Chevanage- 22nd March 2009

It was up at the crack of dawn to pick up Jack twenty man for the 3 hour plus drive up to Gloucestershire. And another cracking day weather wise it was as we arrived at the track. This was my first Midwest event, I’ve heard good things about the courses and the running of the events, so i was keen to see what the whole thing was like.

A massive entry had assembled so this was going to be a very competitive race in all the classes, excellent stuff!
Done all the necessary and went down to the start ready for the flag to drop, and today I was entered in the vets class instead of the usual clubman 2t.
As the flag dropped I got a ’corker’, and was lying about 4th into the 1st corner, and that’s where I stayed until about half way round the course when I stupidly had an ’off’ and subsequently lost loads of places!

Anyway, onto the course itself. A quick blast across a few moto x type fields after the start it was, before we headed into the woods. I was pleased at holding onto my place on this open bit of track seeing as I had the bigger bikes breathing down my neck trying to get past me. Into the woods then it was, and nothing too spectacular to report about although the going was a bit tight and you virtually had nowhere to overtake at all. It wasn’t long before we caught up the tail enders of the clubman 4t, but with nowhere to pass, the good start I made became as much use as a ‘chocolate fireguard‘, as the bikes followed each other in Indian file at a leisurely pace! ‘Bloody well hurry up someone, I’m trying to race here’! sprung to my mind, and I just thought to myself, how long is this going to last then?

One slippery steep climb in particular was my downfall on the very 1st lap as I came a cropper on the way up it. I had no choice but to go back down and try again, no problems 2nd time, but because of everyone ‘jamming’ up behind each other in the woods, I’d lost quite a few places. No fault but my own, simple as that.

A few more open fields to blast across, a nice little tricky water crossing, more tight woods with yet hardly any room for overtaking again! And the lap was complete. I reckon on it being about 7 miles at most. A good mixture of everything, but in my opinion. Just too many bikes for the length of the course. 250-260 riders?
I would of thought some of the expert riders found things a little frustrating at times even with their skill and riding ability.
Clubs like Camel vale and Xmoor have half the number of riders in their events and are nearly all woods, they don’t have any such problems with overtaking, and even if you do get stuck behind a rider, rest assured, it’s not for long. Enough said,Point made.

The race for me didn’t really start to happen until the course got a bit less ‘choked’ up, probably after about an hour or so into it. That’s when you started to get a bit more space so you could go through the woods at a good clip with getting held up by the usual ’train’ of riders. I must admit to getting a bit frustrated by it all.
That certainly didn’t help my cause as I made some more mistakes on that steep climb and had to go and do it all again a couple of times, Aaaaaargh!

I was really ‘nailing’ it across some of the fields though, flat out in 6th gear, and checking the old speedo when I got home, that’s the fastest I’ve been on the gasser so far, 112kmh, about 67-68mph? (The bigger bikes must have been touching 80mph surely?) Still, not bad for a 125 across a field, and she would have done more, but i had to shut off for the corners! Can’t wait to put a smaller sprocket on the back and take her up the straight at Weston!

I pitted ok just after the 2 hour mark, and with the track being more clearer, I felt a lot better than I did earlier on. I was now starting to enjoy it a lot more and felt confident and started to pass a lot more riders than I did before.
I went to finish, but to be honest, I could have done another 3 hours! I wasn’t tired at all and I can only put this down to the slow early pace due to the way the race panned out coz usually I’m ‘cream crackerd‘ at the end of it all!

Jack had a cracking result, 2nd in his class (vet expert), but I didn’t do so well and was a tad disappointed with 9th in the vets. Never mind, there’s always next week.
Overall a well run event, good track, but too many riders for the layout of the course. I will be doing some more of the Midwest races throughout the year, so I’ll be looking forward to see what those events are like as well.

Finishing position: 9/44 (vets)

Things aren’t looking too clever for this coming weekend at the moment, got a virus from somewhere and I feel absolutely sh*te.

Castle park- 15th March 2009

(pic by brewbs)

Would you Adam and Eve it? The Castle Park jinx struck me again! I ran out of fuel again (see blog Nov 9th 2008)

Well, what cracking weather we’ve had lately, so it was nice to drive for a couple of hours in bright sunshine up to Castle park. I picked up Adam Blake on the way as he was riding as well.
I’d had a new clutch put in the bike this week, a heavy duty one at that, it had caused a few teething problems when I tested out in the week, but thankfully all sorted now.

Yet again a few lads from our neck of the woods made the trip up and we managed to get all parked up next to each other so we could all have a good bit of banter amongst ourselves. Jack Twentyman, Andrew Smith, Phil Harris, and me and Adam.

So with bright sunshine it was off to get the bike looked over and to sign on. It’s amazing who you meet sometimes when your standing in the queue ain’t it? I got chatting to the guy in front and it turned to be an old competitor who I had many battles with a couple of years ago when I started out doing the ORE series. Mark Schofield it was, haven’t seen him for a couple of years, and when you read on, he turned out to be my saviour, unbelievable! (more of that later).
Also had a quick chat to the next young ’top gun’ waiting to make his name nationally in the enduro world, Rich Tucker, take note everyone!

Got back to van and had a friendly bit of ’competitive chat’ with Andy Smith, who had the bit between his teeth today because he didn’t like me beating him last time out at the SCEC race a few weeks back. Although to be honest, I did send him an e-mail to remind him of it, so we were all set for a good battle today!
Then we all went down to the start to do the sighting lap. I’m not very keen on them myself, but everyone to their own.

So onto the start itself and I didn’t make a bad one, in the top 10 as we tore across an open field and onto the moto x section before entering the woods. This 1st section gave everyone a bit of breathing space to sort themselves out, albeit being fast, but there was plenty of room with some nice jumps thrown in for good measure. Andy got just in front of me and I hung on to his back wheel trying not to let him get away but with the adrenaline at a high, a rider tried to overtake me and overcooked it and went down straight in front of me. I hit him and nearly came off, but managed to stay on and with that I took a quick look back to see if he was alright, hit a rut and off I came! Oh bugger, I lost sight of Andy and by the time I got re-started I must have lost at least 10 places!

The woods themselves were not as badly rutted as the last race that was held here, but still tricky in some places and even with the recent dry spell of weather we’ve been having, some of the trails were still wet and slimy. Not very technical, but enough to give you a test if you got it wrong!
We went in and out of the woods a couple of times across some moto x type tracks which joined parts of the course together, one having that massive ‘big dipper’ where you just pinned back the throttle, hammered it downwards and rode back up the other side, great stuff, and flat out.
The whole course being about 7-8 miles I reckon, so a good lap.

After the 1st lap shenanigans I settled in nicely and felt good, not too much to report and I had only had a little ‘off’ due to over balancing in a slimy rut.
I think it was about after an hour into the race when I came round to the lap scoring that I saw Adam standing there, helmet off, so obviously he’d had a problem and couldn’t carry on.
Around the 2 hour mark I pitted and Adam was there to give us a hand, so I had a quick stop, and back out I went.
I still felt good, so was really enjoying it and everything was going well.

The last couple of laps and with me going the same pace and not letting up, I passed rider after rider as quite a few had slowed down a bit. I started my last lap 10 mins before time, and still feeling good, pushed even harder hoping to make a place or two. I managed to get passed 2 other riders in my class and pulled away from them until the Castle park ‘jinx’ struck me again.
With just about ½ mile from the finish, I ran out of fuel! Dear oh dear, I couldn’t believe it, and with me stopping every bike in sight in order to ‘blag’ some fuel off of someone, those 2 riders that I’d just overtaken, got passed me again as I stood there stranded. Turns out that indeed I did lose 2 places as they were on the same lap as me and finished just in front of me due to my unexpected stop. Pee’s you off a bit that, chasing someone for 3 hours, passing them, and then getting overtaken again near the finish coz you ain’t put enough fuel in!
A YZ stopped for me and helped us out, I thought I recognized him, and I couldn’t believe it was Mark Schofield, hadn’t seen the guy for 2 years, met him at signing on, and now he’s came to my rescue, spooky or what?
With no one about with any kind of vessel to put petrol in, I thought quickly and emptied my camelbak out, Mark took his fuel pipe off, and we put some in there.
She fired up, and off I went again to finish the race.
I know what you’re thinking, why don’t I put more fuel in? Well to be honest, I’ve now got the ‘gasser’ pretty much spot on when it comes to how much I need, and today was no exception, I just didn’t compensate for the sighting lap which in the end cost me. So in theory, I did have enough. Aaaargh!, those bloody sighting laps!

Nice to finally meet up with Pete Boyles as well. I met him in the pits at the end. Pete's been following the blog from the earley days so it was nice to put a face to the name as it were. Mind you, we're going to be at each others throats this week as we're both riding the Midwest race in the same class!

When I got back to where our vans were parked, we weren’t very happy campers at all. Adam’s front sprocket had rounded off after only 3 or 4 laps, so he had a DNF.
Jack Twentyman was lying on the floor in agony ‘chundering up’ all over the place after having a big ‘off’ in 4th gear (champ rider in 4th gear, that’s got to be fast) and I was a bit annoyed about the fuel episode.
We all concerned about Jack though, and it was a good 20 mins before he even moved! We did offer to take him to the ambulance, but Jack is as tough as old boots and after a while he’d recovered enough to make the drive home.

Overall an enjoyable day and it was nice to have some decent weather for a change instead of me freezing my nuts off all the time!


Fishing position: 8/27 (clubman 2st)
Bike status: new clutch

A weekend off! - 8th March 2009

It's been a very busy last 6-7 weeks with me out on the bike every weekend either racing or practicing, so today i had a day off from it all.
Feels weird to get up on a Sunday and not think 'bike'. To be honest, my shoulder seriously needs a rest, so not racing today won't do it anyharm.

I've started to add some links on the right handside of the page that might come in useful, so feel free to click away.

Plans for the next few weeks are:
15th Track'n'trail
22nd Midwest mcc
29th Xmoor enduro club

See you there!

Inside Park- 1st March 2009

If you closely at the photo you can just see me in the distance to the right of 147's camelbak in the red kit/white helmet still on the bloody start line! What happened? Read on.
(pic by brewbs)


So fresh from finishing the BEC last week it was out again on the bike and a trip up to Dorset for an SCEC event. I had no doubt in my mind that it wasn’t going to be a 22 mile lap at this event!

Up before the crack of dawn for an early meet near Liskeard with Andrew Smith and Phil. We all traveled up together in my van and got to Inside Park with plenty of time to spare, in fact, well over 2 hours, could have had an extra hour in bed!

The good thing was, there was a strong group of riders all from Cornwall who made the trip up there and 3 of our vans were all parked next to each other, so we all had a good chat. Jack Twenty man, Tim Lewis, Dave ‘Butch’, as well as my motley crew, and also Steve Jose who was marshaling for the day.

Upon signing on I got to met ‘Brookster’ one of the guys off of the adrenaline trip forum. Nice chap, good rider as well! Also Had a quick chat with Jed and Arthur who’d also traveled up from my neck of the woods. Bloody hell, the place was crawling with us, there was also a couple of champ riders from Cornwall entered, perhaps we should have hired a coach, put the bikes in the back and had a party on the way on the way home!

Onto the start then, very very cramped indeed on the clubman start, hardly not enough room to line up and I was sort of behind the 2 bikes either side of me, so no chance of making a good one. In fact, I couldn’t even see the flag where I was because the starter was slightly out of view round the corner! So I was sat there looking at my watch on my bars thinking I’ve got another 20 secs or so to go before the flags drops, when all of a sudden, everyone kicks their bikes into action. And we’re off! Oh b*llocks, I ain’t even put my goggles on yet. I just instantly kicked her over and off I went. The first couple of hundred metres or so was a bit of a moto x track before we entered a single track wooded section that would have been tight enough to ride a pushbike through, let alone a motorbike. This instantly caused the inevitable hold ups and with the start I had, I could do nothing but queue up and wait in order to carry on. So frustrating that when everyone’s pumped full of adrenaline on their 1st lap and you get a part of the track within a minute of the race starting that causes traffic jams.

When you got through that first tight section the course then went into the forest proper and with track conditions being extremely dry, it made for a very fast race today. Nothing really worth noting about the track, just miles of forest trails, the usual really, nothing technical at all, and not many roots either. I reckon about 7 miles in length, very easy to ride and enjoyable. Just before the end of the lap you did get the chance to try your luck by going over a huge fallen tree or taking the easy root and going round it. It didn’t cause me any problems, so over it I went.

Due to getting held up a bit on my start ,I came round at the end of lap one in about 15th (looking at the lap times), so about mid pack, but with no adverse track or weather conditions to hold anybody up, it was going to be a bit of a job catching riders up and passing them.
After last weeks race and with my confidence up, I was going really well, I felt really good and the ‘gasser’ was singing all the way round the course, happy days!

About 1 ½ hours into the race my clutch started to play up and the lever wouldn’t release itself properly from the master cylinder, so when I used it, I had to wait a minute or two in order for the pressure to came back and the lever to right itself before I could use it again! Not good, and everytime I came round to the lap scoring to stop and swipe my transponder, the bike just stalled and i had to put it in neutral, fire her up again and wait for my clutch to come back before I could set off again! Right pain in the arse that was, so I tried not use the clutch too much before I reached lap scoring!

I pitted just after the 2 hour mark still going well (albeit with a dodgy clutch) and kept the pace up hoping to catch some riders in my class.
By the time my last lap came I was on a roll and I felt I was really going for it (my last lap was my fastest) and I managed to catch and pass a few riders in my class which just goes to show, ’it ain’t over till the fat lady sings’. I felt really good about that, after all, I’d been chasing them for 3 hours or more! Finished up 7th in the end.

A good day, no ’offs’, mishaps or damage, that makes a bloody change, and for the first time I beat Andy Smith who came up with me. He’s not gonna be happy about that I can tell you.

Turns out now that when I hit a tree at the Muntjac last week I’d damaged the clutch master cylinder somehow, so time to get that fixed me thinks.

Finishing position: 7/27 (clubman E1)