RAW Ball Breaker: ACU BEEC season gets going at Hapton
By Dick Law on 17th Jan 24
After just over two hours of head-to-head racing at RAW Enduro’s Ball Breaker Enduro, round one of the ACU British Extreme Enduro Championship, Mitch Brightmore snatched the win from under the nose of Jonny Walker following a bar-to-bar battle that saw them trade the lead throughout. At the end of it all, the pair crossed the finish line separated by just over 10 seconds.
Wayne Braybrook and his enthusiastic team had spent days laying out a very testing course on the hills above the town of Hapton in Lancashire. And despite the chilly conditions, riders turned up in large numbers to test themselves.
There were effectively two tracks. One slightly easier one that ran for two hours in the morning for the Sportsman, Vets Over 40, Vets Over 50 and Youth class, while the main two-hour event in the afternoon was for the championship race and had even harder bits added. The Championship Experts, Clubman and Elite Vets would all compete in the PM programme.
After a very short start straight, the riders had to pass through a gateway, which caused some fun with riders getting their elbows out. It was then through the old quarry to the first of the Championship deviations. This was called Barney’s Rubble, a steep hillside covered in loose sharp-edged moving rocks just waiting to catch out the riders. It sounds simple but all the riders had to do was go up one side, around a post and come back down. Even so, it caused some problems.
The wooded section caused lots of traffic jams in both the morning and afternoon races, with it digging out despite the early morning frost. It caused queues all day.
Then, just as the riders thought the end of the lap was in sight, they came to Leap of Faith and Double Trouble, where the Championship riders took in a very steep and grassy climb up and across the side of the gorge and a frightening descent down into a stream. Needless to say, this was where most of the spectators were gathered with plenty of oohs and aahs as riders failed to make it but lots of cheers and clapping when they reached the top.
To finish off the lap, the course went along Ravine of Doom, which was along a brook at the bottom of a ravine with steep banks on both sides and massive water-covered rocks to catch the riders out. They were still pulling machines out of here as darkness fell.
As the lead riders came back into view at the end of the first lap, Mitch Brightmore was in the lead with Walker in his wheel tracks and Mitch’s younger brother, Ashton, close behind. By this point, the leading three had already opened up a sizable lead over the rest of the Championship riders.
20 minutes later they were back at Double Trouble. Mitch Brightmore and Walker were still swapping places for the lead but Ashton Brightmore had slipped back a bit although he still had a comfortable lead over fourth-place man Richard Moorhouse.
For the remaining three laps of the total, five, the story was the same as Mitch Brightmore claimed the victory, but only just, from Walker. Ashton Brightmore was a comfortable third - that's if you can use the word comfortable in an extreme enduro report. Moorhouse, who was the last rider on the lead lap, hung onto fourth, albeit some 17 minutes behind the third-placed rider.
Jack Spencer, James Allen, and Jack Price all completed four laps in the allotted two hours with Bradley Allen being the best of the rest.
“I have been on SuperEnduro preparations recently, so coming to this extreme enduro was a bit of a change”, said winner Mitch Brightmore. “I enjoyed every minute of it and had a good close battle with Jonny Walker but just managed to snatch this win on the last hill. I am very happy with my day.”
Runner-up Walker was magnanimous in defeat. “It was a really tough event with some very tricky bits,” he said. “I lost the win right at the end but Mitch was riding really well so fair play to him. When I was in the lead, it was difficult to open up any gap as bottlenecks would bring us back together. I knew that to beat Mitch, I had to get to the big hill before him, which I did, but then a backmarker got in my way and Mitch slipped by for the win. There was about two seconds in it after two hours of racing.”
Ashton Brightmore was content with third. “I got a good start and the top three of us pulled away from the pack a bit,” said Ashton. “As we came around to the rocks again, it was chaos, but we managed to pick our way through. It settled down a bit for a while till I pitted. The top two had managed to pull away a bit then but I felt good all day with my fitness and the bike and I am happy with my result.”
Lee Sampson dominated the Expert class and finished a lap in front of second-place man Matt Stubbard, setting the fastest expert lap time on his way to victory. Dec Bullock was third from Alfie Royle and Radford Chugg.
It was close at the top of the Clubman class, with the top four riders all completing four laps and all crossing the finish line within five minutes of each other. Joel Sadler, who is an accomplished trials rider and was riding his first extreme enduro without any practice, took the win from Danny Calkin and Loan Haycock with Tyrone Metcalfe just missing out on the podium.
Of the four Elite Vets taking part, John Lumley was the winner as he completed three laps with Richard Wozencroft and Simon Tate joining him on the podium.
In the AM competition, Haydon Stansfield won the Sportsman class from Archie Walker and Damon Bancroft, with Josh Hornshaw claiming fourth.
Chris Day was well in control of the Vets Over 40s as he won by a lap from Grant Gillender and Neil Marshall.
Chris Green won the Vets Over 50s from Andy Longden and Neil Dawson, while in the Youth group, Fraiser Lampkin, son of 12-time trials world champion Dougie, won the class despite losing a footrest before the start of his final lap. It didn’t slow him down too much and such was his pace that he would have won the Clubman class too. Conner Watson finished second with Alex Andrews third.
ACU British Extreme Enduro Championship Results Round One – the Ball Breaker Enduro
Championship
| 1 | Mitch Brightmore | 5 laps |
| 2 | Jonny Walker | 5 |
| 3 | Ashton Brightmore | 5 |
| 4 | Richard Morehouse | 5 |
| 5 | Jack Spencer | 4 |
| 6 | James Allen | 4 |
| 7 | Jack Price | 4 |
| 8 | Bradley Allan | 3 |
| 9 | Burts Crayston | 3 |
| 10 | Ben Wibberley | 3 |
Expert
| 1 | Lee Sampson | 5 laps |
| 2 | Matt Studdard | 4 |
| 3 | Dec Bullock | 4 |
| 4 | Alfie Royle | 4 |
| 5 | Radford Chugg | 4 |
| 6 | Jack Winn | 4 |
| 7 | Shane Carless | 4 |
| 8 | Jed Balmer | 3 |
| 9 | Thomas Widd | 3 |
| 10 | Jamie Dilworth | 3 |
Elite Vets
| 1 | John Lumley | 3 laps |
| 2 | Richard Wozencroft | 3 |
| 3 | Simon Tate | 3 |
| 4 | Lee Ramsey | 1 |
Clubman
| 1 | Joel Sadler | 4 laps |
| 2 | Danny Calkin | 4 |
| 3 | Loan Haycock | 4 |
| 4 | Tyrone Metcalfe | 4 |
| 5 | Jae Jarvis | 3 |
| 6 | Simon Booth | 3 |
| 7 | Nathan Parker | 3 |
| 8 | Oliver Yeardley | 3 |
| 9 | Mike Taylor | 3 |
| 10 | Dan Billam | 3 |
Sportsman
| 1 | Haydon Stansfield | 4 laps |
| 2 | Archie Walker | 4 |
| 3 | Damon Bancroft | 4 |
| 4 | Josh Harnshaw | 4 |
| 5 | Ben Dixon | 4 |
| 6 | Adam Ainslie | 4 |
| 7 | Harvey Ridge | 4 |
| 8 | Ryan Potter | 4 |
| 9 | Ricky Mitchell | 3 |
| 10 | Kalum Williamson | 3 |
Vets Over 40
| 1 | Chris Day | 5 laps |
| 2 | Grant Gillender | 4 |
| 3 | Neil Marshall | 4 |
| 4 | Dean Williamson | 4 |
| 5 | Steven Hopps | 4 |
| 6 | Phil Taylor | 4 |
| 7 | Jason Simpson | 3 |
| 8 | Jonathan Lambert-Cousins | 3 |
| 9 | Graham Dickinson | 3 |
| 10 | Jason Clarke | 3 |
Vets Over 50
| 1 | Chris Green | 4 laps |
| 2 | Andy Longden | 4 |
| 3 | Neil Dawson | 4 |
| 5 | Nick Barrow | 3 |
| 6 | Carl Tannant | 3 |
| 7 | Brett Waddell | 3 |
| 8 | Willy Lloyd | 3 |
| 9 | Paul Cunningham | 3 |
| 10 | Stevie Hanna | 3 |
Youth
| 1 | Fraiser Lampkin | 4 laps |
| 2 | Connor Watson | 4 |
| 3 | Alex Andrews | 3 |
| 4 | Dexter Hind | 3 |
| 5 | Curtis Mealham | 3 |
| 6 | Jake Tansley | 2 |
| 7 | Dorian Bedron | 2 |
| 8 | Maciej Dwornik | 1 |
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