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All content © Bob MuIIins | ||
 
GH Motorcycles Santon Enduro The 2016 Enduro season burst into action in Thetford Forest as the Diss MCC organised GH M/cs sponsored Santon Enduro opened the championship series in the east with Iots of national stars spicing up proceedings... Two hundred riders faced the sandy dry conditions of Thetford forest with a great flowing test and twelve mile lap testing all the riders. Brad Freeman 250 Colwyn Bay KTM set the standard with a blistering first test showing the fruits of his winter training. Centre fans had lots to cheer about as 2015 eastern centre champion blasted into a great second place on the 350 Walters/Aim KTM SOME 6 seconds behind Freeman but just 0.04 seconds clear of 2015 rival and former centre champion Aston Bird on the 450 GH Suzuki with Joe Wootton on the 450 Freestyle Husqvarna a further quarter of a second behind him. Multi eastern centre champion Kiwi Hockey slotted his Dr Shox 350 Husqvarna into fifth a further second down. Wootton knew he had to up his game on the second test and he did but the Freeman two stroke KTM combination were also flying... Joe just put the Husqvarna at the top of the heap on test two by less than half a second from Brad some four seconds clear of Luke Parker on the 450 HMC Honda showing his MX skills in this so competitive woods racing securing fifth overall after his two tests. Wootton had done enough to take second overall with Jamie Roper substantiating third overall with a solid fifth on his second test. The very experienced Daryl Bolter on the 250 Crescent KTM showed consistency to finish fourth after his two tests. Bird's second test didn't quite run as smoothly and he slipped to sixth after his two tests. As ever the riders had four more laps to go and all eyes were on the last time control to understand whether the final 12 miles of the ever more bumpy/berry track would extract time card penalties from the stars. Brad Freeman showed his pace on the going too rolling into the finish with a comfortable minute in hand.the top 13 finishers all showed that clocking in on time was possible but they had all worked hard to stay clean. So the final order remained Freeman from Wootton with Jamie Roper starting his 2016 centre championship campaign in the best possible way with a strong third. Bolter, Parker and Bird rounded out the top six.
The close battle between Diss MCC's Mark Chapman on his Bavin Yamaha and sponsor Gav Hockey in the expert vet class ended with Chapman's test times delivering him the victory with both losing a minute on the going with Phil Roper slotting into third - with just 3 expert vets managing to only lose one minute on the challenging final lap... In the clubman class Nathan Greenaway on the Team Dave Roper KTM set the combined test pace but lost four minutes on the going. Stowmarket's Dan Willis topped the clubman class with good test times and a clean run too from Ben Ramus with Katie Walker a solid third. However Katie on the 250 ET James KTM was fleeing after the first test but a minor mistake on test two cost her the overall victory. Alex Walton and Tom Sargent rounded out the top five with again only nine of the clubman managing to stay clean. In the clubman vet class Wayne Fulcher came out on top but the super vet Mark Houson eclipsed the entire clubman classes cleaning the going and finishing 15 seconds faster than any clubman. His test times would have given him a respectable place in the championship class!!! As ever Andy Waters the stalwart clerk of the course had set the times spot on and with the ever enthusiastic Diss team ran another first class event setting the standard for the 2016 GH M/cs centre championship with centre Enduro riders and fans only having to wait 7 days for the Woodbridge MCC's second round of this popular series... Full results at www.dissmcc.co.uk
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In the expert class Adam James on the ET James KTM showed his national
form with two strong tests and a clean time card from Sudbury's Alex Rampton
on the 250 Dr Shox Yam who finished five seconds down on the Rhayader man
with Alex Barkshire on his 350 KTM a further 3 seconds behind. Just 7
experts managed to clean that tough final lap.