Another for Jarvis
By TMX Archives on 18th Jun 08
GRAHAM Jarvis continued his impressive comeback' in his quest to retain his Colin Appleyard British Solo Trials Championship crown with another win, his second on the trot, this time in the West of England club's Anthony Rew Trial, the fourth round of the seven round 2008 series. Grimbo had had to give best to Scarborough's Michael Brown in the opening two rounds, while he finished fourth and second but has bounced back to bag wins in the Mitchell Trial plus the follow-up in the West Country.
Sunday's event took place once again on the excellent piece of trials land at Kelly Farm, Lustleigh, Devon, where the shaded, large granite rocks and boulders and earthy banks provided the usual balance of tricky, technical sections that really make riders work for their cleans.
The 10-man Champion-ship class, plus twice as many Experts who battled it out over slightly eased sections, plus three super-keen Youths, were faced with a dozen tough hazards which were lapped three times. The opening lap took place in dry conditions before rain made things slippery second time through before the shower came to an end and the hazards dried-out remarkably quickly. In all, while certainly difficult, the sections for both main classes proved a fair test.
In the Championship class, the opening lap proved to be a three-way battle for honours between the series leader Michael Brown, reigning champ Jarvis and Lancashire's Shaun Morris who really seemed to be getting the hang of his lightweight Raga Replica Gasser. After an early maximum in the second hazard, cleaned by Jarvis, Brown and eventual fourth-placed Alexz Wigg, Shaun really got his act together and led the opening lap on 14 marks thanks to a brilliant effort through the difficult seventh, eighth and ninth sections where he lost just three marks compared to eight for Jarvis and seven for Browny.
Graham, who added a time mark for finishing the opening lap one minute late, made his crucial move on the second circuit when he eased the four-stroke Sherco round for a mere 10 marks. Morris didn't do a lot wrong and equalled his own opening lap score but Browny had a bit of a nightmare and followed up a pair of fives at sections three and four with another one at eight and a lap of 23 effectively sentenced the TTT Beta runner to third place.
The Premier, and with it the all-important 20 Champ-ionship points, was wide-open right to the death with Shaun holding the advantage until the seventh section before fatigue set-in and he struggled a bit towards the finish as Graham just swung the pendulum his way to win by a mere two marks – including another two marks for late finishing to add to his opening lap time-fault!
Browny regained his composure to finish strongly in third place but saw his Championship lead reduced to just two points from old-stager Jarvis!
Alexz Wigg was in a clear, if lonely, fourth place on the potent 300 TRW Montesa. Alexz overcame a bust chain on the eighth hazard on the second lap, while Ross Danby again got the better of his Gas Gas team-mate Sam Haslam.
In the well-supported Expert class it was all about local boy Joe Baker. The talented Scorpa-mounted quiet man managed to motor through all his three laps in single figures although to be fair, the three podium finishers, Joe, Dan Thorpe and 125 Beta-mounted Jack Challoner, all avoided dropping a five ALL day.
Joe led right from the start and was never headed, with laps of seven, eight and and four, the latter being easily the lowest of the day.
Thorpey was his usual self, a model of consistency as his lap scores show, while Jack improved measurably on each lap to overtake Novogar ace James Fry.
The eighth section was probably the most difficult and, along with several others did push the compulsory section time limit. Said Joe, "My one regret on the day was mis-hearing my dad giving me my time check in the eighth section on the second lap. I was still clean when I thought I had only 28 seconds left and as I had a way to go – it was a long, long section – I got my feet down and made sure I got to the Ends cards. Turned out I actually had 48 seconds!”
As usual, the relatively low scores of the podium finishers disguise the true severity of the sections. In the Championship class, fifth finisher Ross Danby was in three figures while in the Experts, ninth man Nick Baker (Joe's cousin) headed the ton-plus club. But the general concensus was that it had been a hard but fair day provided by the West of England section plotters.
Contenders now get to enjoy a summer break before the next round, the Yeadon and Guiseley club's MacKenzie Trophy Trial at Brimham Rocks on Sunday, August 3.
COLIN APPLEYARD BRITISH SOLO
TRIALS CHAMPS
Rd 4 – Anthony Rew Trial (West of England MC)
CHAMPIONSHIP CLASS
1 Graham Jarvis (Sherco 4T) 16 + 10 + 16 + 3 = 45
2 Shaun Morris (300 Gas Gas) 14 + 14 + 19 + - = 47
3 Michael Brown (270 Beta) 16 + 23 + 18 + - = 57
4 Alexz Wigg (300 Montesa 4RT) 25 + 30 + 31 + - = 86
5 Ross Danby (250 Gas Gas) 28 + 37 + 48 + 3 = 116
6 Sam Haslam (300 Gas Gas) 38 + 33 + 49 + - = 120
7 Gary MacDonald (290 Sherco) 44 + 46 + 39 + - = 129
8 Lee Sampson (290 Sherco) 53 + 44 + 49 + - = 146
9 George Morton (270 Beta) 54 + 51 + 46 + - = 151
10 Craig Robinson (Gas Gas) 50 + 52 + 54 + - = 156
SERIES STANDINGS after 4 (of 8) rounds: 1 Brown 72 points, 2 Jarvis 70, 3 Morris 62, 4 Wigg 46, 5 Haslam 43, 6 Danby 42, 7 Morton 29, 8 MacDonald 26, 9 Robinson 24, 10 Sampson 22, 11 Dabill 17, 12 Austermuhle 6, 13 Phillipson 4.
EXPERT CLASS
1 Joe Baker (250 Scorpa) 7 + 8 + 4 + - = 19
2 Dan Thorpe (300 Gas Gas) 11 + 10 + 9 + - = 30
3 Jack Challoner (125 Beta) 16 + 10 + 8 + - = 34
4 James Fry (290 Sherco) 10 + 19 + 13 + - = 42
5 Liam Walker (300 Gas Gas) 14 + 17 + 17 + - = 48
6 Chris Pearson (290 Sherco) 25 + 17 + 18 + - = 60
7 Ben Wibberley (Gas Gas) 31 + 20 + 29 + - = 80
8 Gary Jenkins (290 Sherco) 30 + 31 + 34 + - = 95
9 Nick Baker (Gas Gas) 37 + 33 + 34 + - = 104
10 Andy Blackman (Beta) 30 + 34 + 40 + - = 104
11 Philip Kettlewell (Gas Gas) 31 + 34 + 40 + - = 105
12 Miles Jones (Montesa 4RT) 30 + 34 + 42 + - = 106
13 Ross Hancock (Gas Gas) 31 + 43 + 37 + - = 111
14 Jason Lawer (Montesa 4RT) 38 + 34 + 41 + - = 113
15 Josh Law (280 Gas Gas) 35 + 42 + 37 + - = 114
EXPERT STANDINGS after 4 (of 8) rounds: 1 Joe Baker 77 points, 2 Challoner 69, 3 Thorpe 56, 4 Fry 49, 5 Walker 41, 6 Ben Hemingway 39, 7 Pearson 33, 8 Wibberley 27, 9 Matthew Jones 26, 10 Jenkins 25, 11 Miles Jones 14, 12 Vesterinen 11, 13 Brice 10, 14 Adam Jones 9, 15 Nick Baker 7, 16 Blackman 6, 17 Crinson 6, 18 Kettlewell 5, 19 Hancock 3, 20 Bayliss 3, 21 Lawer 2, 22 Woods 2, 23 Welch 2, 24 Law 1, 25 Sherwin 1.
EXPERT 125cc STANDINGS after 4 (of 8) rounds: 1 Challoner 80 points, 2 Adam Jones 51, 3 Graham 32.
YOUTH SUPPORT CLASS (Non-champs)
1 Ben Morphett (125 Gas Gas) 13 + 26 + 18 + - = 57
2 Jonathan Richardson (Sherco) 20 + 30 + 17 + 2 = 69
3 Ricky Wiggins (125 Gas Gas) 31 + 39 + 43 + - = 113
NEXT ROUND: Aug 3 – MacKenzie Trophy Trial (Yeadon Guiseley & DMC).