Glorious sunshine greeted the riders for Round 2 of “The Builth Wells Hare and Hounds series 2008” at Church Farm, Crossgates, just outside Llandrindod Wells. A superb track just over 3 miles had been set out by the club. The track had everything, and even though there had not been any rain in this part of Mid Wales for over a week, the course was still very wet in places and would prove a challenge to even the expert riders.

At 11am the experts set off, followed by the Clubman, Veteran, Sportsman and Sidecar classes. Some good riders turned out including Round 1 winner Tim Foreman from Llanidloes, fellow Llanidloes rider Dylan Jones, PAR Honda duo Lee Edmondson and Ashley Wood. Builth Wells Club Chairman Gethin Price was also riding on his Genus Honda 450, along with fellow club members Tom Knill and Jonathan Williams.

The course followed some of the old “Welsh 2 Day” special test and some new loops and rides had been added by the club. The course was very interesting in some places and proved to be very technical, but even though there were problems with riders getting stuck etc… there were always keen marshals willing to lend a hand. Everything seemed to run very smoothly and the track seemed to hold up well. Some of the experts were really flying around and doing laps in around 7 and a half minutes.

After 3 hours of fast and furious racing it was Dylan Jones of Llanidloes on his Yamaha YZ125 who took the win completing 24 laps of the track. In second place was Andrew Edwards from Wrexham, third place went to Mark Roberts and fourth place to Club Chairman Gethin Price, all of these riders completed 23 laps respectively.

Local rider Sean Buchan of Llanbister won the big Clubman class aboard his KTM. Sean was the only rider in the class to complete 21 laps. In second, was Anthony Griffiths and Ryan Golding came third. The Veteran class was won by Paul Sagar on his KTM 125; Neil Williams from Brecon was second aboard his Gas Gas, his smooth riding style really suited the technical track. Third place in the veterans went to Chris Roberts and fourth went to Simon Evans from Wrexham. Simon was initially excluded, but was later reinstated. This was due to a misunderstanding for which we apologised to Simon.

It was Swansea rider Ryan Leary who won the Sportsman class with 18 laps to his credit. Aled Price from Rhayader finished in second position, he also finished runner up in the first round so is going well in the overall series. In third place was Danny Morris. All three of these riders completed 18 laps.

To spice things up the club had decided to include sidecars in the event as well. Club members Matt Taylor and Nick Morgan were looking good early on aboard their KTM VMC 525 until they lost their back brake. They eventually finished in third place. The winners in the sidecar class were championship crew David Williams and Graham McPhee. They had a brilliant tussle with Steve Price and Aled Jones as the race progressed. In fact Steve and Aled led for a large amount of the race but it was Williams and McPhee who went on for the win, just three seconds ahead of Price and Jones.

Overall the event was a great success. Club members had put a huge amount of work into getting the event ready and we were very lucky with the weather as well! The course was great to ride and we had some very positive feedback. Thank you to all the marshals, helpers, St Johns and also landowners Jim and Gareth Griffiths. Hope to see you all at Round 3-Bwlchciliau H&H on the 2nd November.

Apologies to any riders who have had their positions modified, the results we released on Sunday were only provisional. Having compared the electronic results with the punch cards and manual backup we identified some corrections had to be made.

Thanks once again for your support!