SAND RACING REPORT 13^th April 2013

On a wet Saturday afternoon the 3^rd element of the summer motorsport season (after the sprinters & hill climbers) got underway as the sound of revving engines filled the air above the sands of Vazon bay as the sand racing season got underway for the first of 10 meetings. The usual mix of racing cars, saloons, Sliders, Juniors & cadets assembled to race over their traditional oval courses but a new feature for this season after some hard work by the organisers was the introduction of a Motocross class on a course which turned sharp left just after the start line into the infield, this lead to another sharp left followed almost immediately by a 2 foot high jump off of a man made ramp, into a right hander which took the riders back unto the back straight just prior to the wet bend. The ramp was adjusted as the meeting progressed but further work will have to be done on it before the next meeting as many of the riders were by passing it as the ramp was too short & made landing difficult as the bikes suspension was not able to take the forces being applied. Still the riders did not give up & this class was totally dominated by Hamish Moriarty whilst the runner up places were fought out by Nick Russell, Alain Branquet & Tony Duquemin. The other riders having their on battles in field of 9 riders that entered this meeting.

The 6 local slider riders that were not put off by the bad weather were joined by 3 English riders, Dan Winterton making a welcome return from injury, Ben Ilsley & 2012 British Sand Race champion Danny Warwick all getting in practice before this year’s championship meeting in June. Whilst Dan managed the wet conditions, Ben & Danny appeared not to have waterproofed their bikes well enough only managing to get into a top 3 position once each, though Danny did take the first trophy of the season.

Only one race was won by a local rider with Rob Teed taking the honours in the first championship race, whilst Mike Clarke & Dave Cleal were racing for the minor placings.

Junior’s only had 3 competitors but it was good to see the Rive twins out for the start of the season with Billy having to learn a new riding skill as he was out on a 250cc slider which ran well for 3 of the 5 races. Cadet’s saw an increase in numbers to 8 riders but is was regular rider Daniel Clarke having to battle with new rider Rhys Melass for the winners slot whilst Braden Morris on the smallest bike managed to place in the top 3 in all races. The numbers racing reduced for the final races & this may have been caused by rider tiredness or bike problems as they were using the same track as the Juniors & sliders.

8 Cars started the meeting only nonstarter was Gary Duquemin so this left Jack Sanders as the only racing car though he was competing with the 4wd saloons of Simon Carre & Darren De Carteret. The only retirement came from Craig Whales in the 1800cc Honda Civic thus leaving close fought battles between the other 3 cars in the production class 1400-1800cc. Newcomer to Vazon Lee Sebire took 3 wins but he was closely followed by both Wane Martel & Eric Trump but it was Eric who began where he left off last season in taking the first handicap race of this season, how many more will he collect before the year is out?

Paul Stanford.