Combat sQuad
By TMX Archives on 26th Feb 09
ROMAIN Couprie is the master of the Le Touquet Quad Beach Race as, once again, the Frenchman was in a class of his own as he secured his fifth win in the gruelling three-hour event in the deep sand on the north west coast of France on Saturday. Couprie hasn't finished off the podium in seven races! He was second with partner, and fellow Frenchman, Jerome Fournier in 2003, won with Pascal de Palma in 2004, was second on his own in 2005, partnered Blaise Parent to wins in 2006 and again in 2007. He rode to an individual win in 2008, and added another victory at the weekend.
The 490 quad competitors made their way down the narrow roads of the usually sleepy town of Le Touquet on their way to the massive beach for the 1pm start where they were lined up in groups of 50 to be set off to the first corner some five-miles away in waves at 20-second intervals.
It was supposed to be 20-seconds between each wave, and it was for the first three or four groups, but it became a lot less as the last of the keen riders set off and there wasn't much the organisers could do about it.
Of our own home grown riders, John Mitchell (ATV World Yamaha) was in the first group, but current British QuadX and Quad Endurance champion, Paul Winrow (Winrow Honda) was in the second and that meant he had 50 of the world's best quad riders already in front of him even before his race started.
Matthieu Ternynck (450 Yamaha) was in the lead as the riders came back into view over the very large man-made jumps alongside the main sea wall, with Jeremie Warnia now mounted on a Can-Am in his wheel tracks.
However, Couprie on his Yamaha France machine had the pair in sight and wasn't letting them get away.
The three riders had already managed to open up a gap over the rest of the pack, headed up by Belgian riders Jan Vlaeymans and Cyril Debouck, with Winrow in around tenth having already passed Mitchell... and lots of others.
At the end of three laps, Couprie was just over one-second behind Warnia with Vlaeymans up to third, albeit already 12-seconds behind the two men going for it out in front.
Winrow was in fifth, just behind the fast starting Ternynck, as Debouck dropped back to seventh spot.
Stefan Murphy, partnered by Giles Davis on a second Winrow Honda, were in 13th, one place ahead of Mitchell, with Ben Morgan going it alone in 37th place.
With one-hour gone and many competitors dropping out and the rest starting to do the first of their fuel stops, the leaders got mixed up a bit, but one thing was for sure, Couprie was going to take a lot of stopping as he now had a good minute's advantage over Vlaeymans, Warnia and Winrow, as the Murphy/ Davis pairing were forced to drop out with an engine problem.
Mitchell was hanging in there in ninth place, just one spot behind US rider, Josh Fredericks, while a trio of Brits Will Waggott, Clint Eagle and Ben Morgan were hanging on around the 50th mark.
INTERNATIONAL QUADURO DU TOUQUET
Le Touquet, nr Boulogne, FRANCE
(OTSC Le Touquet)
OVERALL (TOP 10): 1 Romain Couprie (F - Yamaha), 2 Jeremie Warnia (F - Can Am), 3 Jan Vlaeymans (B - WTEC), 4 Jerome Bricheux/ Julien Hartout (F/F - Suzuki), 5 Paul Winrow (GB - Winrow Honda), 6 Franck Allard/ Cyril Lamet (F/F - Suzuki), 7 Clement Jay (F - Yamaha), 8 John Mitchell (GB - ATV World Yamaha), 9 Julian Valentin/ David Bertrand (F/F - KTM), 10 Pascal Rocherau/ Keveen Rocherau (F/F - Yamaha),...
OTHER BRITISH FINISHERS: 33 Cathal Mc Gilligan/ Justin Read (Can-Am),... 35 Ben Morgan (Honda),... 44 Paul Hannam (Honda),... 59 Will Waggott (Honda),... 95 Jonathan Knight (Honda),.. 100 David Cowan (Yamaha),... 107 Rod Orchard/ Duncan Irons (Honda),... 135 Conor Lynch/ Micheal Boyit (Honda),... 141 Ian Neill/ Andy Britton (Polaris),... 143 Peter Gallagher (Honda),... 171 Lee Cornish (Yamaha),... 200 Chris Murphy (Polaris),... 220 Phillip Robinson (KTM),... 253 Colin Player/ Anoren Perrett (Honda),... 296 Oli Sansom (Suzuki),... 318 Alan Bromiley (Kawasaki),... 323 Tony Crook/ Jordan Crook (Honda),... 344 Rodney Dennis/ Richard Horton (Honda),...
YOUTH QUADS: 1 Marvin Deus (Yamaha), 2 Florian Mangeot (Suzuki), 3 Antoine Duchemin (Yamaha), 4 Laurent Boissy (Yamaha), 5 Christopher Thiers (TM), 6 Lubin Sain (Yamaha).
FOR FULL REPORT SEE T+MX NEWS, FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2009