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All content © Bob MuIIins | |||
 
WOR EVENTS WULFSPORT WINTER HARE SCRAMBLES RD 1 SOLO RACE: “Roy’s the Boy!” A very wet and wintery Llandrillo forest greeted the riders at WOR Events latest production, The 1st round of the club’s Wulfsport Winter series 2107/2018. This proper forest Enduro venue can run in 99% bad weather and always offers a superb challenge and ride out for the riders and this event’s 6.5-mile lap was no different with a superb mix of fire roads, trails, rocky lanes and some slop in the trees. A very healthy turn out of both solos and quads took to the start line (separate races) and battled the elements superbly.
Will Orritt was still never far away from the front until he ran out of fuel on the last lap whilst leading the Experts, this allowing young Robert Francom to come through in his very first race in the Experts class and take a well-deserved win matching the 9 laps of the front runners. Once again former TT star, Steve Mercer travelled the long way up from Kent to take part with the WOR Org and showed how his riding is going from strength to strength each race. Mercer blasted his 300 KTM to the Clubman win and indeed a fine 3rd place overall as his fitness and speed gelled nicely for this Winter round 1. A special mention for Steve to as he packed up, drove all the way back to Kent and then started a night shift at work…That’s commitment indeed. Runner Up Clubman was Gareth Jones with a fine ride to make the trophies along with Dan Griffiths in 3rd place whom having won WOR’s NHS series this year moved himself straight to Clubman and secured a podium at his first attempt in WOR’s higher groups, well done Dan. Top Clubman vet was Justin Jones from Ryan Fallows and Richard Bentham in second and 3rd place respectively. Justin with a very healthy 13-minute advantage over Fallows with both riders on 8 laps each and Bentham in 3rd achieving 7 laps as he returned to racing after a long time out. Duncan Humphreys (Husky)looked to be enjoying the tough Winter conditions as he topped the Over 50 class on 8 laps with a 10-minute advantage over Runner Up, Gareth “Rhug” Jones (Husky)also on 8 laps. 3rd spot went to Beta mounted John Citrine with 7 laps to his credit after the two hours. In the Sportsman it was the consistent riding of Neil Hawksey that picked his way through from a steady start to eventually take the class win on 8 laps and a very narrow 13 second advantage from Runner Up, Young Beta mounted Brodie Heyes, Liam Belfield back from a very nasty Hand Injury was leading for a long time in the group and proved his worth by moving straight up to the Clubman class for the next race. A very well done to all on the Sportsman podium. Anthony Foulkes topped the Sportsman Vets from Stephen Thornton with another spirited and determined ride to complete 8 laps. In the Youth class Hayden Rainford and Dillon Emyr matched each other on 7 laps with a 4-minute advantage going to Rainford, both riders had benefited from a private David Knight school the week before and used their new-found tips to their advantage in the gnarly woodlands. Finally, in the solo groups it was the Novice lads with Dan Griffiths taking the win from Tony Rainford and Chris Cannon with the top two riders on 8 laps and Cannon on 7 laps. An epic opening to the Wulf sport winter series for solos that’s for sure, even with the nasty rain the riders all crossed the line with beaming smiles and with the new timings of the event they were packed up and out of the venue on their way home by quarter to 1. A very quick turnaround of a few track changes and tweaks by the WOR team had a very healthy line up of Quads take to the start line for their Separate 2-hour race challenge. QUAD RACE:
The 4x4 Expert class was topped by Dean Foster in his first move up to the experts at WOR, Dean on a very loud and noisy Can-Am by just 2 seconds from John Robson whom had swapped his usual 2wd quad for a beast of a 4x4 for this winter series. Those two rode around inseparably for the duration. Tom Jones and Martin Benbow finished in 3rd and 4th place respectively having lead the first lap, an injured rider was being tended too, causing a marshal to re direct Jones and Benbow into a loop they had already done, so to put things right the WOR team looked at the lap times and awarded the pair a 4 minute and 20 second credit to their final scores. All close at the top with all the top 4 completing 12 laps each. Danny Lloyd is a 2wd Expert quad rider that can make thing fly and coming back from recent injuries and operations it was nice to see the likeable young man take a very well-deserved class win as the others in his group suffered DNF’s. Derek Burns and Neil Martin both CAN-AM mounted topped the new and disappointedly supported 4x4 Lights class with Batman Burns on 12 laps and Martin on 11. The 4 x4 Clubman class which was won by Sean Welleans from Danny Gilligan with both riders giving their all and completing laps each as did the Bronze finisher in class, Martin Evison. The biggest group of the day was the 2wd Clubman and they were topped by a superb ride from Young Danny Percival on 11 laps from Runner Up, Paul Dobson and Mark Lakeland in 2nd and 3rd place respectively with both riders on 10 laps each. The Quads all did well with many a determined ride taking place throughout the 2-hour race time.
The weekend went superbly with lots of riders enjoying the terrain and course and not letting the weather (Un-forecasted by the way!!) ruin a magnificent event. The WOR as always would like to thank the staff, caterers, medics and landowners along with the Sponsors and supporters of the events but as always leave the main thanks and love for the riders that keep coming out in their droves to support these events and make them happen. WOR’s next event is this coming weekend 11/12th November no frills play and practice at the Clubs superb all weather sand and pebble quarry in Stoke on Trent followed by The awesome TEAM EXTREME Enduro on the 19th November and then the week after on the 26th November a superb Forest Timecard Enduro. .A busy month indeed. More details at www.worevents.com/events NB : The next round of the WULFSPORT WINTER HARE SCRAMBLES series is on December 10th @ CARROG Isa where all the trophies from Rd 1 will be waiting for the riders to collect. STATS / LAPTIMES SOLOs - QUADs
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Starting at 10am for two hours was the solo race and first man back to the
lap scoring zone and in fact the race leader for at least an hour was Will
Orritt, looking very neat and quick on his Husky. Will was going well but not
quite as well as Expert Vet rider, Ron Prescott whom tracked down Orritt and
took the lead just after the hour mark as he was revelling in the Winter
Conditions and his new Husqvarna 2t. Prescott stayed at the front of the race
to fend off the hard charging Darren Skillin whom claimed 2nd placed Expert
Vet by a very solid 5 minutes’. Third place Expert was David Orritt with all
3 riders on 9 laps.
The track was reduced in its length for the quads by around 2 miles as the
modification took out some downhills that were ok for a solo but would not
have suited the 4 wheelers. Still an action-packed forest enduro course
awaited the Quad folk. A 12 :30 sharp start saw near 35 quads take on the
challenge ahead and blast into the North Wales countryside.
Something must be said though Once again about the noise levels of the
quads. Totally unacceptable was the racket coming from at least 12-15 of the
quads taking part. Each rider was spoken to about it by the WOR organisers and
Race Boss Steve Ireland has made it clear, if at round 2 of the series the
noise is still a problem, WOR will cease full stop in running Quad races. A
final warning from the WOR team indeed.z&8DPy{52