THE motocross season ended on a real high at the weekend. Pleinmont Point was again bathed in sunshine as the different championships were decided in the final round of action.
‘It’s been a really good year,’ said Guernsey Kart and Motor Club’s motocross captain Anyon Robilliard.
‘We’ve had the most riders taking part and we’ve got some promising young riders who are looking good for next year. It’s all looking good.’
In the auto class for the youngest riders, Riley King won all the races in the meeting on his 50cc automatic-geared KTM machine to take the championship by a convincing margin.
In the next class up, the juniors, Jersey’s Ryan Caurel copied King as he won all the races on his 65cc geared machine.
He also took the championship but only by eight points from second-placed Sarnian Bradley Matthews, who ended his day in the ambulance after losing control of his KTM at high speed and colliding with a catch fence.
Luckily for Matthews he had only a bruised shoulder.
In the smaller of the 85cc classes, Ross Pinel from Jersey won all the races, but it did not stop local rider Mike Dempster from lifting the championship.
But it was in the 85cc senior class for riders up to 15 years of age that the closest championship was fought out.
Chip Le Page went into the meeting with a two-point advantage over Elliott Bates.
In the first race, Le Page looked as if he was going to lift the title when he crossed the finish line ahead of Bates.
However, the second race spelt disaster for Le Page.
Riding hard to overcome a poor start that saw him at the back of the pack, he took a huge tumble while trying to jump past a slower rider over the biggest of the jumps. He managed to remount but his race was already over.
Bates, meanwhile, had recovered from his first-race defeat and rode brilliantly to capitalise on the situation.
Going into the final championship race of the day, both riders were even on points and they both had everything to ride for.
And it was Bates who rose to the challenge with an excellent start and another inspired ride to cross the line in front of his rival to lift the championship by just one point.
Being the only rider in the youth 125 class, newcomer Eloise Boucher continued to improve her riding to take the championship title as a reward for her efforts.
There was some very close racing in the adult MX2 class as Mark Burbridge and Lloyd Wallbridge had long duels in nearly every race.
Neither rider gave an inch on their identical Kawasaki KXF250 machines.
In the first race, Burbridge brilliantly held off Wallbridge until the last bend, where Wallbridge found some extra grip from the outside line and managed to catapult himself past to take his first win of the day.
Young Brett Pearce was sidelined for much of the first race, but made up for it in the rest by winning the other two championship races.
Unfortunately these performances came a little too late in the season and consistent rider Sam Clark took the championship honours.
In the MX1 open class, Wallbridge was seen on the line again on a larger-capacity KTM machine.
Riding back-to-back MX2 and MX1 races is a real test of fitness but he stepped up to the plate by taking two wins in each of the classes by the end of the day.
The other two victories in the MX1 class went to Wallbridge’s elder brother, Carl.
Luckily for Robilliard, the Wallbridge form came a little too late and the club captain was handed the championship with a 17-point advantage over the elder Wallbridge in second place.
‘I got off to a really good start in the first half of the season but the second half wasn’t as good as Carl had the measure of me,’ said Robilliard.
Competitive motocross now takes a break until the 2008 season commences on 2 February.
Loading ...
Share this article:
What are these?