It was Wain'ing cats and dogs!
By TMX Archives on 29th Jun 07
IF it rains heavily next Sunday at Erba, for the Italian round of the World Trials Championship, Michael Brown will do what he did last Sunday at Marsett - grin and bear it! No doubt about it, The Atom' did the business at the wet and windy 41st National Wainwright Shield trial at Marsett, Yorkshire, where the conditions went from muggy but dry, to torrential rain in the space of ten minutes.
Those who have experienced the whims of Marsettand Bardale Fell will know only too well that, when the fell vanishes,it is because rain has blanked it out, as it did at 2pm on Sunday. Thatrain took out over 40 riders and they were either soaked, sufferedmachine maladies, or both. Forty, out 154 starters was some casualityrate.
This was going to be an on-off Wainwright forPatrick Darbyshire and his crew. ''Mid-week we had three feet of watercoming down Bardale Beck and at the top of Raydale the sections weresubmerged up to Friday afternoon before the levels dropped. Right up toSaturday I was debating whether or not to run the trial,'' commentedPatrick as the event kicked off from Raydale Grange Farm.
Jack Knoops was actually taking in the sun whenthe Clubmen arrived at his section three. No great problem for them butthe initial bit was in the narrow green-slimed rocky stream. MichaelBrown, Richard Shepherd, Dan Thorpe, Chris Pearson, Jonathan Frost,James Carr and Gary Pears were all clean but John Sunter, John Crinson,Andy Cripps, Gavin Black and Craig Robinson had all lost marks in thefirst three sections. Only Brown, Crinson and Zac Sherwin blasted theExpert route up the fourth. Thorpe got it wrong and took a scrabblingthree, while the next best were Mark Sunter, Craig Robinson and ChrisPearson with a long long single stab at the bank.
A hundred yards west and into Raydale Gulley,where the fifth to eighth were hard and slippery, and the midges savageman-eaters. Five and six were deep in the bottom of the ravine so theywere wet and slippery. Only Chas Lee, Anthony Ayrton, Shepherd andThorpe bossed the fifth section while Brown, Pearson, Crinson and bothSunters took a safety dab.
National Wainwright Shield Trial
Marsett, Yorkshire,
Experts: Micheal Brown (Repsol Beta) 22 markslost, Chris Pearson (MRS Sherco) 35, Dan Thorpe (JST Gas Gas) 42, JohnCrinson (MRS Sherco) 48, John Sunter (Sandiford Montesa) 53, CraigRobinson (JST Gas Gas) 75, Andy Cripps (Gas Gas) 87, Mark Sunter(Scorpa) 98, Richard Shepherd (Sherco) 100, Gavin Black (Beta) 107.
Clubmen: Joel Sadler (Acklams Beta) 29, DavidBraithwaite (Montesa) 32, Stuart Oughton (Gas Gas) 32, Phil Scott(Montesa) 33, Simon Levett (Montesa) 35, Darren Michell (Beta) 36,Robin Harker (Sherco) 41, Stuart Hall (Sherco) 41, Gary Younghusband(Beta) 45, Chris Manby (Scorpa) 45.
For full story and pictures see T+MX NEWS, Friday, June 29, 2007.