Dougie Lampkin produced an incredible performance to claim seventh place at the French Grand Prix earlier today, a result that sees him finish sixth in the final 2009 SPEA FIM Trial World Championship standings despite having ridden the closing two rounds with a badly injured left wrist. Lampkin's result today could have been so much better, but a broken clutch hose cost him valuable time during a second lap when heavy rain greatly increased the severity of the sections.

Still suffering the effects of the broken wrist he sustained back in August, Dougie was once again forced to sit out most of the two official practice sessions at the French ski resort ahead of today's trial. The thirty-three old veteran campaigner had arrived for the final GP of the season hoping that his wrist would be far better than it had been in Spain seven days earlier, but in reality this was not the case. Dougie tried a different support to the one he had worn at the previous round, but it was still obvious that he was both in pain and was riding with only a limited amount of movement on sections that were testing even the fit riders.

Taking all this into consideration, Lampkin approached the day as another damage limitation excercise, but with a string of cleans in the opening hazards, Dougie soon found himself unexpectedly leading the event as the first lap moved towards a close. However a five in section fourteen increased his lap total to ten marks, and left him in joint fourth place at the halfway point.

Despite this late setback Dougie was still in a good position, riding well ahead of his rivals with the promised rain now looking a certainty. But disaster was to strike as a broken clutch hose in section six caused Lampkin to stall his factory Beta, the five mark penalty was bad enough, but the time to effect the repair was to prove even more damaging. The rain arrived and made the sections slippery and much more difficult as Dougie's second lap score showed.

Disappointed at what could have been a strong close to the year, Lampkin stated. "I couldn't believe how well I was riding this morning as I could hardly even manage to practice for a few minutes over the last couple of days. Everything was going too well when I fived the second to last section on the first lap, but still it was not an absolute disaster."

"That came at section six on the second lap. At first I could understand why the bike had stalled, it was only when I tried to restart it that I realised that the clutch was not working. A five on one of the easiest sections was not great, but the time we lost sorting it out was what what really cost me. Anyway I suppose the result is still OK given my current level of fitness, and at least I have managed to save sixth in the championship."

"My wrist is quite swollen, so perhaps I might need to return to the doctor this week." Dougie ended.