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Gisburn XC Bank holiday special BIFF SMITH THE KING OF GISBURN!! ROUND 3 EUROTEK PUTOLINE NORTHERN XC CHAMPIONSHIPS Gisburn once again lived up to and exceeded expectations as the best
venue in the north, the combination of a wide grassland course, a tricky
woodland section and the steep Barn's banks give the course a real feel good
factor. Dirtbike action's John Kerwin got the extreme race started on schedule at 3 pm, Eurotek rider Joe Chambers was quickly into the lead and started to pull away, the first of the extreme sections called 'pointless' a greasy off camber section 75 metres long had the riders struggling some manage better than others Chambers avoided the queues by taking the lower more difficult route' The stream bed and climb out was also causing problems to the riders, but most kept circulating around and at the finish Euroteks Joe Chambers won by 2 clear laps from David Dudley 2nd and Phil Hancock in 3rd, in the club/040 class it was Chris Green the victor by a narrow margin from Alex Owen with Ross Hall 3rd the sportsman class was a 123 by the Gateshead boys Dean Hall, Micky Blissett and David Hall all the riders enjoyed the race with the exception of 1 lone rider . A big thanks to all the marshals who worked relentlessly keeping riders moving. Sunday arrived with welcoming sunshine, bringing hoard's of extra riders the sign on team were hard pushed to process all the extra riders for the 11 am start but it started on time with 160 riders lined up in 6 rows race director John Kerwin got the 2.5 hour race underway as the clock hit 11 , Biff Smith was leading by 30 sec margin at the end of the 1 lap riding a loaned Sandiford 250 sherco 2 smoker, the chasing pack of Ryan Staveley, Chris Hughes Nathan Ball, Phillip Hancock, David Dudley were losing ground to Biff and had settled early on to battle for second place, as the race continued to develop Ryan Staveley had machine trouble that put him out of the chase, Chris Hughes and the ever improving Nathan Ball were fighting it out for second spot not far behind was Ryan Hoare , Biff was continuing to pull away and lapped everyone a least 1 on his way to a well-deserved win and the title king of Gisburn!! Second in the experts was Chris Hughes, with Nathan Ball third. The 040 class is usually the second most competitive class and this proved to be the case with Eurotek bossman Mark Jackson taking the win with 13 laps from Lancashire's leading scribe on all things enduro Ross Hall, with his riding kit still on Chris Ball finished 3rd events can be judged on severity by how much clothing Chris finishes with!! all these riders would have finished well in the experts such is the quality in the 040's and they were a lap clear of the winning clubman Steve Jemmison with Darren Skillen 2nd by a 2 sec margin from Tom Barron all on 12 laps Andrew Maben was on fire in the o5o class taking the win from Ian Heyworth with Peter Fletcher 3rd while in the sportsman class Jimmy Davy finished 1 from Phil Dodsworth with Luke Owen 3rd in the novice class Ben Hurley was first On reflection the weekend was a great success, once again the dirtbike action crew were blessed with sunshine over the weekend despite vast parts of the country suffering heavy rain. The only down side is the large number of riders that want to wait to Friday/Saturday before entering its much easier to enter early online and save the huge queues at sign on. By entering online all the paper works done except for a quick signature and the riders could have had pre printed backgrounds supplied but you can't order them on Saturday afternoon. big thanks to the dirtbike action crew especially the lap timing crew they had to decipher some comedy race numbering from the riders . Next rounds in the northern xc championship October 25th - Westwood
November 15th Dalton
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