Sand Racing Report 9th April
2016
April showers greeted the 42
competitors(both young & old, seasoned & new),a huge entry, together
with the required officials & marshals as they gathered on Vazon sands for
the 1st meeting of the 2016 sand racing season, to do battle for the
various class championships & trophies. The cars were originally split into
2 groups with the production classes now sponsored by Whiteway Motors Ltd
having their own race & the modified saloons & racing cars having their
own race, unfortunately with a couple of cars breaking down over the practice/1st
race it was decided to combine the races to make it more interesting. First to
go was Richard Valpied when a stone holed the sump on his new Golf, whereas a
broken rad hose caused Simon Carre to retire. The production cars were fairly
evenly competitive so close racing was guaranteed & making a return to
beach racing after 30 years was Paul Helyer in his road legal Mazda MX5
slightly modified so that front indicators were mounted on the bonnet & the
rad fitted smartly in the boot proved to be a thorn in the side of the regular
saloons. OzzyOzanne in the Subaru estate was mixing in with the 2 racing cars
taking the win in the final race when Gary Duquemin winner of the 1st
car handicap race of this season, had a spectacular off along the outside of
the top straight which was littered with large stones & deep puddles,
having a misted up visor he ploughed through the biggest rock filled puddle
without any damage & having cleaned his visor continued to race.
The regular local slider riders were
joined by 2 UK riders Andrew Whitaker who has raced here before & making
his debut on both beach & slider was Brett Ellis together with Jersey rider
Jamie Griffith. Andrew proved to me tough competition for Anthony Bougourd both
taking 2 wins whilst Colin Teed came away with the 1st trophy win of
the season in the handicap race for this class. Having raced in this class on a
250cc bike last year Billy Rive was out on Bill Cohu’s 500cc bike was battling
in the mid field of this competitive class sponsored by Guernsey Trade Windows.
The MX class sponsored by Nick Russell Turf laid out a heart shaped twisty
course on the infield for their first 4 championship races before moving onto
the oval track for the last race. Though Billy Rive took 4 wins he will have to
watch out for both his brother Ricky & Billy Russell who gave chase all
afternoon together with an impressive performance for Jarrod Carrington as he
moved up to this class from the Intermediates. Further down the field there
were battles between the Le Messurier&Pinchemain families.
All the youngsters were riding in the
Junior/Intermediate class which had bikes ranging from 85 to 250cc & were
either sliders or MX style machines. Dominating the class was as expected Dan
Clark who managed to lap most of the class once or twice during these 5 lap
races. Battle for second was between Ben Le Prevost &Kieren Bennett on
identical Kawasaki’s whist new comer Lewis Henderson was in a regular 4th
place slot. Luke Bush had to ride Ben’s spare bike as his Honda 125 had broken
& looked a little large on the smaller bike but had some battles with Erin
Ogier out on the largest bike in the class a 250cc slider. Her brother was no
so fortunate as his Kawasaki slider & his sister’s spare bike kept breaking
down on him so was not placed in any race. Only 2 sidecar outfits were entered
in the hands of Clint Blondel/Ross Young & Bill Cohu/Jason Carre& they
only managed to complete 3 of their 5 races with Clint having the upper hand on
a new lower powered outfit for local events, the faster outfit to be kept for
the Sand Ace meeting. Hopefully when we returned to the beach on 23rd
April at 12.45pm there may be even more competitors across these classes.
Paul Stanford
Paul Stanford
Paul Stanford