FAST EDDY’S RELENTLESS!
WORDS: G.TURNER
PICTURES: CETRA EVENT PHOTOGRAPHY

Once again the rain tried to dampen the spirits at the latest WOR events production, the GAS GAS XC championship, round 2 at the superb TYFOS Estate in North Wales.
Once again the wet stuff failed!!

Two quality XC events ran on time and to the usual Standards that this class leading club always run to.
The circuit to be fair, although very slippy after torrential overnight rain, remained totally ride able and offered the riders a very varied circuit indeed with technical woodland, awesome open mountainside and some fast forest roads.

It was a shame that the rain came down and made things trickier than they need have been because on the day before (sat) the course was bone dry with powdered berms and loamy, peaty soil. All said and done though all of the riders crossed the finished line with a smile and a handshake for the clerk of the course.
Testament to yet another great WOR event.

The usual 2 race format catered for all categories and had the intermediate race start at 9.30 am and the pro race start at 12.30pm.

The clubs ban on noisy four stroke MX pipes (and noisy unpacked 2T’s) is certainly working as several riders were simply turned away and not allowed to ride as their machines did not comply with the new zero tolerance rules that WOR have established. This is very positive move forward for the sport and one that will surely take a few more disappointed riders before the riding public finally understand the logic behind it.

The Morning Race:
Top rider was Allan Hopwood with another solid ride in the over 40’s class.
Second place over 40 was Dave Ellis, Ellis however did struggle with his bike for the duration of the event and was not on his usual pace.
Husky mounted Kev Humphries was third.

On his 16th birthday the ever improving Sportsman rider, Ben Ball took a great class win and a superb 2nd overall in the entire race.
Runner up sportsman was Paul Englan with Darren Heyes taking a very well deserved bronze.

The best lady rider of the morning session went to Kate Lloyd on her CF racing GG125. Kate had been trailing a fair bit behind young Jane Daniels but a mechanical DNF put an end to Daniels day.

In the always competitive youth class it was Gethin Humphries that took a very impressive win from the flying 85 of Joe Wootton. George Knowles was a solid 3rd place on his 125 Suzuki.

Top Novice rider was Gareth Lewis with a sportsman level result and a clear winning margin from Ollie Coop in the runners up position.
Final place on the winner’s rostrum in the Novice class was Carl Thomas.

With results and presentation complete within 5 minutes of the finishing rider all was set for the main event and the Pro’s to go out and show what they were made of.

THE MAIN RACE:
The afternoon race at WOR now has an Elite class (Pros) and after a slow start has now picked up and is totally worthy of it involvement as some of the best riders in the UK took on the GGXC challenge.

One of these riders is one of the best in the World, never mind the UK and, simply cruised to a start to finish win. That rider is Paul Edmondson. Riding the RELENTLESS Suzuki RM 250 2t, Edmondson showed that nearing 40 years of age that he still has and probably always will have the ability to make tough off road riding look easy. Almost floating over the tougher sections of the track and hardly even revving the machine made the svelte Midlands racer look effortless in his quest to take the win.

GAS GAS UK’s top rider and certainly no slouch, Wayne Braybrook was always looking good and not far from Edmondson. A fair testament to Wayne and Paul is the fact that neither of them has been racing on a bike much in 2008 and to just show up and blitz the rest of the field like they did is simply awesome.

Braybrook used all of his feet up trials and extreme enduro skills to look as impressive as Edmondson on the courses gnarly sections and come the end of the race was only 36 seconds down on Fast Eddy after being some 1.45 minutes down earlier on.

Riding for the first time with WOR and very impressive he was to was the strong Welshman Gethin Price. The Honda-mounted rider fully deserving his 3rd place trophy and podium glory.
After battling for what seemed like a life time with former British 125 Enduro Champion Andrew Edwards, Price finally pulled away with aid of the big grunt his 4t Honda had.

KTM’s Edwards finally finished in 5th place after Justin Wilson (ROCKET CENTRE/RFX YAM 250) nipped him on the last lap and took a 2 second advantage at the chequered flag. To be fair to Edwards though his little 125 was down on power with the bigger bikes on some of the fast open moorland bits.

A special mention to Mark Roberts… riding on his 21st birthday and putting in another solid performance. Happy Birthday Mark.

Onto the experts and it was Ben Wootton’s day with a comprehensive victory over his peers.
Ben on his day can run with the best of them and the he showed this today being the only expert to match the Elite rider’s 12 laps.
Martin Jones took a great runner up placing with over a minute advantage from GG rider Luke Meredith.
 
As always the Clubman class is super competitive and the 3 youngsters that usually top the class have a combined age of less than 50!!
Third place went to Owain Humphries and was fully deserved as he leapt past his rival Daffyd Jones on the final hill decent to take a 5 second advantage and the bronze award.
Runner was the always consistent Jamie Robinson, who was 3 minutes down on the smooth and flowing class winner Gary Daniels.
Both Daniels and Robinson were on 11 circuits to their credit.

In the over 35 Championship Veterans it was once again the ever green Jack Twentyman with a convincing class win. Jack finished 3 minutes clear of the hard charging Ian Barnett who in turn was a fair way ahead of third placed Darren Griffiths.
Richard Main seemed to be having an off day but still came in a strong 4th.

Finally onto the super vets in the over 45 group and after leading for most of the first 1hour and a half Ray Whittle tired and eventually succumbed to the demanding roots and ruts in the woods and finished in a solid 3rd place.
Whittle was a lap down on paper behind the hard charging Gareth Lloyd in 2nd and class winner Dennis Harrison.
Harrison out on his two wheel drive KTM CRISTINI was only 6 seconds ahead of Lloyd whom had a terrible start and dropped at least 1.5 minutes with a schoolboy error. That mistake costing the aggressive Lloyd the class win. Harrison however deserved the win for never letting Whittle get to far away and showing that battling on to the end brings its rewards.

The morning race ran for 2 hours and 40 minutes and the Pm race ran for 3hours and 10 minutes so once again the riders had been given their fill by the enthusiastic and always professional WOR events team.

WOR’ next event is on the weekend of 10/11 May and sees the Junior FMF series Round 2 and the MICHELIN Fast Cross round 1 unfold at Carrog, Near Corwen.

POST SCRIPT:
A minute's silence was held on the start line of the Pro race for the very sad passing of one of WOR’s best friends and sportsmen.
Expert rider and semi pro Rugby Player, Aled Evans (29) was tragically injured in a work related fall and passed away on April 20th.
He will never be forgotten and a memorial Enduro will run every year in Aled’s name from 2009.
Race winner Paul “Fast Eddy” Edmondson whom had visited Aled in Hospital the previous week with Steve Ireland dedicated his awesome race win to ALED.
RIP mate from all at WOR!