A Brits blitz at Erzberg Rodeo
By TMX Archives on 1st Jul 11
British riders play a major role in the awesome Erzberg Rodeo and they all have one thing in common... they are trials aces!
I'VE seen most every type of off-road, or on-road come to that, motorcycle event in my time but there's one that keeps escaping, despite a promise I make to myself every year to DEFINITELY go and see what it is all about and that is the Erzberg Rodeo. Sorry to say that in the hurly burly of modern life it just slips away each year. Any event that attracts almost 1,500 entries would make you sit up and take note but one that creates a spectacle like we know Erzberg does surely pulls at any motorcycle sport enthusiast like a magnet.
Austria's Iron Mountain certainly pulls British entries like a magnet and they aren't just there to make up the numbers. With Dougie Lampkin and Jonny Walker on the podium and the brothers Hemmo, Ben and Dan breathing down their necks in the top 10 British riders very nearly totally ruled the roost this year. Then there's the likes of Yorkies Mark Jackson and Martin Craven who virtually run their yearly diaries around riding at Erzberg and Cumbrian brothers David and Sam Myers who finished just behind Jacko and Martin this year.
Many will be surprised at the performance of Jonny Walker, some may not even have heard of him yet. Jonny, from rural Keswick in Cumbria (not to be confused with the Hemmo's East Keswick base in Yorkshire) started out in trials as a Youth rider and maybe not many people remember that he actually won the Pinhard Prize for his performances as a Youth.
Jonny gave National trials a go when he turned adult but then switched to motocross and then enduro where he found his true niche in the enduro world - or rather in the extreme enduro world. Here, he can put his skill as a trials rider and speed as a motocrosser to best use. But to finish on the podium at your first crack at Erzberg is something pretty special.
Jonny is not the first rider to make the switch from trials of course.
There's no better example than Taddy Blazusiak who was a World Class trials rider before morphing into arguably the best extreme rider yet seen. Then there's David Knight, himself a British Champion at trials and Tom Sagar who can make exactly the same claim. And of course Graham Jarvis, who was cruelly robbed of the Erzberg win this year. And Dougie Lampkin - who is already planning his attack on Erzberg next year! The same holds true right down the order and includes Jackson, Craven, Paul Bolton, Andrew Cripps, the Hemmos, David and Sam Myers...all have one thing in common. They were/are all very good trials riders, almost all to National level.
They are also the riders that push themselves whatever branch of the sport they compete in. Not for them a life of Sundays spent riding four-times round a field club trials, life for them is all about the Scottish Six Days, and the Scott Time and Observation trial, always aiming at the biggest challenge there is - and I applaud them all for this.
Now, while I'd probably struggle to get a bike down the Erzberg start straight, never mind to the first Check Point I really do have a hankering for a blast up the Iron Mountain in the Prolog. That alone would be a major blast for me. I must have questioned every rider I ever come across that has ridden Erzberg what that 10 - 20 minute (depending how fast/slow you are!) switchback ride up the mountain is like. I've asked some more than once!
A few years ago David Knight rode one of KTM's mighty V-twin monsters up the hill during qualifying. The first time David sat on the 1000cc four-stroke was on the start-line before blast-off. I asked David what happened.
"I took it easy for a couple of corners - then I gave it some stick!” Knighter being Knighter he blitzed the mighty Katoom to fastest time of the day in something around ten-minutes for pole position in the Rodeo. He didn't ride the 1000 in that though...
WOULD just like to thank all of you who took the trouble to contact me regarding last week's column in which I brought up the subject of where the World Trials Championship is going now that the number of riders in the Championship proper is down to 12... and falling.
I can't claim that anyone has come up with a definitive answer but it is clear that I'm not the only one who feels that a root and branch surgery is required to give what is supposed to be the showcase of trials not only a new lease of life but a new purpose.
At the top level it has become a circus act. Toni Bou is a fantastic rider, probably the most gifted ever. But in truth does what Toni does actually bring anyone into trials? The old adage about people going to the circus and being wowed by the lion tamer (at least they used to before health and safety banned the activity) but none of them then went out to buy a lion is very much true of World Championship trials today...
