A couple of weeks ago I raced the BEC at Knighton which was a good event for where I won my class both days and was 3rd and 2nd overall, but not long after the event I thought I had a bit of a cold which I left and then before I knew it I had severe Bronchitis, the doctor told me that if I was unfit and over weight then I would of more than likely got pneumonia, I was told to rest which I did up until yesterday where I raced the last round of the British Cross Country Championship.

Going into the event I knew I wasn’t full fitness and with Jason Thomas riding I really wanted to try and do my best to stay with him, all hopes of that vanished on the first lap when I went over a jump and saw Ollie Moyce going down and I had no where to go and went straight into the back of the Husaberg which flicked me over the bars.  I picked the bike up to find the front end slightly twisted , a broken hand guard and the worst of all a broken de-compression lever, and being a motocross bike it was something I needed.  I watched all the championship class go past before it fired up and then looking at the dust realised that running with Jason  was out of the question, after the first lap I was about 8th and really struggling in the dust to pass people, Jason already had 2 and a half minutes on me, the dust was horrendous.

I knew then I just had to concentrate on beating Ollie and Ash to secure the championship, I pushed for about 3 laps to try and catch up to them and just as I caught them it was like somebody turned a turned my lungs off, with being ill and breathing in all the dust I was struggling to breathe and consequently got very tired very quick, I passed Ollie and Ash and gapped them a little bit and that was all I could do, 1st and 2nd were gone with having a clear track for a few laps it was enough of a gap that I couldn’t close.

By half way I really didn’t feel good and all I kept telling myself was ‘do it for the team and the sponsors’ my pit crew were really good and kept pushing me as they knew I was struggling, It was the first time I was looking behind making sure I wasn’t getting caught rather than trying to push forward. I stalled the bike a couple of times which didn’t help as it was hard to start after my crash but the main thing was I beat the people I needed to and won another British Championship, now I just need to concentrate on winning the British Enduro Championship.

Rounds 3 and 4 of the sprint enduro took place at Rogershill Raceway near Dorchester, it went well for me but it wasn’t without its ups and downs!

I had been to Rogershill before but on arrival it looked like a different area, Danny Hall had done lots of work and changed loads of things since the last time I was there, from making new jumps, improving the extreme sections and digging a tunnel to go under the road in, and the changes looked awesome.

Day 1 started OK for me, I had a bit of a training crash in the week so I was a little tense starting off but that soon wore off and I just wanted to get a no mistake test under my belt, which I did and had second fastest time to Knighter with Wakely,Special Greg and McLaughlin just behind me.  The  next couple of tests went good and I was in 2nd with a 14 second advantage over Greg in 3rd, however on the 4th test I made a mistake in a corner, lost my balance, gave it a big handful and it jumped out of my arms.  I fell off the back and when I got up to pick the bike up it wasn’t there! It was still rolling down the test on tick over!! I gave chase on foot and just as I caught up to it, it fell awkward  and twisted the bars a little, I  tried hard to make back some time but with the bars not straight the 14 second advantage had gone.  At this point I think Greg smelt blood and he upped his pace on the last few tests and I wasn’t able to match it, so 3rd on day 1 was the best I could do.

Day 2 came round and there had been some rain over night which would help with the dust but also make the hard pack track a bit slick, with a few changes to the course as it was now in reverse I took a slow sighting lap to have a good look around.  I watched the under 23′s to see how slick it was and then Mark Roberts proved it, he had a huge crash on the rhythm section and just about wrote off his 450 KTM.

For me I wanted to get on the pace straight away as I knew Greg would be on it, I was having a good test and then as I was heading back towards the finish there was a log section and  me trying to gain every second I tried to double some wet logs, you can guess the outcome! I didn’t crash heavy but my foot was stuck under the bike and it took me a while to get back on, I’d lost 10 seconds to Greg and Si before it had really started.  The second test I felt a lot better and all three of us set the same time to with in a few hundreds of a second.  I knew that making up 10 seconds wasn’t going easy, and I certainly couldn’t do it on one test, that’s the good thing about the sprints, if you make a mistake you have got time to make up for it. Unfortunately for Si he made quite a costly mistake and lost a lot of time which just left me chasing Greg, but Greg had found his rhythm and every time I pushed harder he did too and I just couldn’t quite match his pace. So 3rd again which is good for me in the championship and good for KTM as it was a KTM  1,2,3 on both days.

Massive thanks to all my pit crew, sponsors and Julian for all the work they do.

Next event is the BEC in Scotland for me so I’ll see you there.

Daryl.

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The first round of the BEC is now done and dusted, with a 2nd in class and 3rd overall.
For me the event went OK, I was happy with my result but frustrated with my riding, I knew I could go faster but for some reason I couldn’t quite clicked with the special test and it seemed the harder I tried the more mistakes I made.  The event was hit hard by the weather causing the test to look like something you might find in Wales rather than Norfolk, previous to the Muntjack I had just concentrated my training on the sand and to find the normally sandy test full of slippery mud and deep ruts I just didn’t have the feeling with how hard to push on the wet ground.

I didn’t make any major mistakes on the tests but I did make lots of little ones that add up after a while around the Muntjack test.  With everyone being close on times it was much easier to lose time than to try and make it up, Paul Edmonson was riding really well and after getting stuck behind someone and losing a handful of seconds, it was going to be very hard to catch him, and with Si wakely not far behind me I didn’t want to push and make a mistake so I settled for where I was.

The event was cut shot by 2 laps and a test which I think was the right decision as it was getting badly cut up and the tight lap would have been to dangerous, overall I’m happy with the result as I know now what I have to do for the next BEC.

Massive thanks to the team, pit crew and the sponsors that came to support me on such a rainy day,

see you at the next race

Daryl.