Enduropale du Touquet win secures Todd Kellett FIM Sand Races World Cup lead
By Team TMX on 6th Feb 24
Defending FIM Sand Races World Cup champion Todd Kellett, kicked off his title defense with a dominant victory at the Enduropale du Touquet Pas-de-Calais as Belgium’s Amandine Verstappen led home the registered riders in the Women’s class and Mickaël De Souza KTM got his campaign under way on top in the Veteran’s class.
Britain’s Kellett, who won the legendary race on the north coast of France last season before going on to claim the inaugural FIM Sand Races World Cup, started the three-hour race near the front of almost 1300 competitors and sat third following the opening lap less than six seconds off the lead.
By the end of the second 13-kilometre lap he was 13 seconds ahead and he began to pull clear of a chasing pack that, by the completion of lap three, saw series registered riders Lars Van Berkel from the Netherlands and Jeremy Hauquier from France running third and fifth.
Illustrating the depth of talent contesting this year’s World Cup, Valentin Madoulaud held ninth at this point with Camille Chapeliere in 12th, Maxime Sot 16th and Joey Nuques 18th and there could very well have been another registered rider running near the front if Belgian Yentel Martens who started the series as a hotly-tipped rider, had not gone out on the opening lap.
By the end of lap four Kellett led by almost one-and-a-half minutes from Van Berkel and Hauquier and although Hauquier then lost third to Cyril Genot as the race approached the hour mark, France’s Chapeliere looked solid in eighth, two places ahead of his compatriot Madoulaud.
By the halfway point Kellett’s lead was almost two-and-a-half minutes and he was in complete control, using all his hard-won experience to find smart lines through the traffic as conditions got increasingly rough, but Chapeliere slowed dramatically and dropped out of contention.
On the penultimate lap Van Berkel fell and lost second position to Genot, but Kellett was out of reach and he completed his 15th and final lap with a winning advantage of two minutes and 14 seconds with Van Berkel an additional 13 seconds behind in third before a gap of over six-and-a-half minutes to fourth-placed rider Brian Bogers.
“Today I feel like I’m back on my good level,” said Kellett. “It’s been a real challenge since my crash last October so I’m really pleased and proud to have done this. It’s a great start to the FIM Sand Races World Cup. This is the biggest beach race in the world – there’s no disputing that – and my secret [to winning] is just the sheer hunger and drive within me.”
The next registered FIM Sand Races World Cup rider to cross the line was France’s Maxime Sot who moved into the top 20 on lap two and pulled through all the way up to sixth overall with Hauquier finishing eighth, Nuques 11th and Madoulaud 16th.
In the fight for supremacy in the Women’s class, Verstappen started strongly and charged from just inside the top 150 riders at the end of lap three all the up to eighty-second at the finish on a total of 12 laps. Mathilde Denis from France, who won last year’s Women’s class in the FIM Sand Races World Cup, finished a lap down on her rival in 198th.
“It was quite a complicated race physically, but from start to finish I kept my pace and held on,” said Verstappen. “So that produced a victory and a finish in the top 100 which I didn’t think I was capable of so I’m really pleased with my race.”
The Veteran’s class is shaping up to be close and competitive this season with De Souza coming home in 42nd overall on 13 laps, last year’s winner Arnaud Besnier finishing in 81st on 12 laps and Christophe Brucker completing a French 1-2-3 in 107th on 11 laps.
There is now a three-week break in the FIM Sand Races World Cup schedule before the six-round series resumes on February 24-26 with the Enduro del Verano in Argentina.
.jpg)
