AS THE island’s top junior motocrosser, James Shorto knows more than most Guernsey young sports stars how living in an island can be a big handicap to a developing career. So, with the support of his parents, Ian and Jill, the 15-year-old Year 10 pupil at St Sampson’s Secondary has travelled to one of the biggest international events in junior motocross, the World Mini Trophy in Belgium featuring 600 riders from across Europe.

Shorto was among 10 or so Channel Islanders competing in the 14-to-18 years category and while the meeting proved a real eye-opener for the Guernsey champion, he outstripped all his Channel Island rivals in placing 24th from an original start list of 100.

‘It is the biggest event we’ve taken him to,’ said Ian, who was delighted that it brought the best out of his elder son.

‘It [Belgium] is the motocross capital of the world really,’ said the young rider himself, who thoroughly enjoyed himself racing in big fields, both in terms of number and size of opponents.

‘It was a bit scary. There were 17-year-old six-footers pushing me out of the way round the corners.’

An 80-to-100ft jump was also an experience that will stick in the Guernsey boy’s mind.

Each of the six categories were split into two qualifiers, with 50 odd-numbered riders in one race and as many even-numbered bikes in the other.

‘If you don’t qualify you get only one race,’ said Ian, who must have been a little concerned when James was last coming out of the corner of his first one.

But he picked his way through the field to finish 14th in his group and in the final placed 24th out of the top 50.

On average, the Sarnian was taking 16min. per lap and his best lap time was 1min. 58sec.

To highlight the level of competition, French 125cc champion Sebastian Pourcel took the honours and was clocking laps of up to 14sec. quicker than the Guernsey youngster.

Shorto had succeeded in his main objective, however.

‘My main aim was to be the top CI rider,’ he admitted and was particularly pleased to have finished well ahead of his main Jersey rivals, Harry Bertram and Dale Campbell.

In the build-up to the Belgium event, Shorto spent a day at the Matchams Motor Park near Salisbury receiving one-to-one coaching from 10-times former British champion and Honda works rider Rob Herring.

‘It was a sand track, the same as in Belgium, and I definitely benefited from that,’ said James.

How does racing on sandy surfaces differ from the hard tracks such as his home circuit at Pleinmont?

‘The sandy stuff is not as consistent. I prefer the hard-pack surface where you know what you are going to get.’

While in the UK, Shorto competed at the Best of British national meeting in Plymouth and won four support races and claimed the holeshot in each of them.

The Shorto family motocross tour then took in a visit to Brittany and a weekend’s training in Plouer sur Rance, near Dinan.

‘You can’t train here so you have to go away and do it,’ explained Ian, who is now seeking ways of funding James’ attack on the full national series in 2005.

*James Shorto is

sponsored by Duques, Holeshot and Condor. He is also grateful to

Mx World for preparing his race bike.