Team GB misses podium on last lap
By TMX Archives on 23rd Oct 08
THE third FIM Supermoto des Nations took place at arguably the world's best Supermoto venue Pleven in Bulgaria. For the past two-years Britain has managed to get on the podium with two successive third places and this year the plan was to go two-places better and snatch the Francesco Zerbi Trophy from defending holders, France.
However, the plans soon went awry with initial picks, Christian Iddon and Ricky Higgs, both having to withdraw from the event. This meant that team manager, David Dearden, had to make last-minute changes drafting in veteran Ady Smith and Junior team member, Chris Hodgson. The Junior Team comprised George Clements, Ollie Pope and 16-year-old rookie, Lee Williams.
There was even more drama before the team left for Bulgaria as Hodgson's regular bike hit trouble at the previous weekend's GP and Cumbrian dealer, Neil Crayston, of Triple D Racing had to make a through-the-night dash to meet the team truck with his personal bike for Chris to use.
After qualifying on Saturday the Senior team was in fifth and the Junior team 14th. Matt Winstanley continued his rich vein of form and was third in S1 class, just fractions of seconds behind Lazzarini and Bidart. The Wigan lad was pretty cool as well as he did all his qualifying on used tyres.
Lee Williams was unfazed by the occasion grabbing 11th. Chris Hodgson was slowly getting to grips with his borrowed machine and qualified fifth with George Clements tenth. In the Open class Ady Smith was eighth and Oliver Pope tenth. After the timed qualifying there were three individual races one for each class to determine Sunday's main race start positions. In S1 Winstanley was third, with Williams 11th. In S2 Hodgson was fifth with Clements tenth but in the Open class disaster struck with Ady Smith suffering a puncture on the warm up lap. Even with a wheel change in double-quick time the opportunity had gone and he finished 14th while Ollie Pope crashed, but remounted to take 11th.
After Saturday's results were tallied Team GB had qualified fifth with the Junior Team 14th. This would give starting grid positions of five and 19 and 14 and 28. Sunday's race format was three combined races with S1/S2 classes in the opener, then S2/Open and finally S1/Open.
A teams best five scores would count in determining the overall Nations standings and the race finishing position gave the points so the team with the lowest number of points wins.
First up was combined S1/S2 race. Winstanley got away well and was soon up to second but a slight mistake saw him fall and drop back to fifth. However, a real fight back ensued and on the last lap he nipped past Bidart on the factory Husqvarna to secure third place. Hodgson, starting from 19th position had a lot of work to do to battle through the slower riders on his box standard 450 KTM and he soon paid the penalty of trying too hard by crashing twice. Nevertheless, the Cumbrian youngster, still only 20-years-old, continued to finish ninth.
For the British Junior team, George Clements took a strong 20th with Lee Williams 24th. After the first race Britain was fourth behind Italy, then, surprisingly, Bulgaria, and France, but only four points separated the top four nations.
Race two was the turn of the S2/Open classes, with Hodgson having to do back-to-back rides. Team manager, Dearden, tried some tactics by putting Chris on fifth grid slot and Ady Smith on 19th. In the Juniors Clements lined-up in 14th spot with Pope on 28th.
What ensued was fantastic. Hodgson got boxed in at the start and came round in sixth after passing seven riders in the first four corners. While the team hoped he could hold this position, Hodgson had other ideas. He then set about passing some of the best riders in the world to bring his standard bike home in an outstanding second place in probably the best ride of his career to date.
SUPERMOTO DES NATIONS
Pleven, BULGARIA
NATIONS OVERALL: 1 Italy 13 points, 2 France 20, 3 Bulgaria 29, 4 GREAT BRITAIN 31, 5 Czech Republic 46, 6 Germany 62, 7 Belgium 71, 8 Spain 75, 9 Slovenia 80, 10 Finland Junior 89, 11 Slovenia Junior 95, 12 Sweden 100, 13 GREAT BRITAIN JUNIOR 103, 14 Finland 113.
RACE ONE (S1/S2): 1 Ivan Lazzarini (I - Aprilia), 2 Alexander Georgiev (BUL - KTM), 3 Matthew WINSTANLEY (GB - KTM), 4 Sylvain Bidart (F - Husqvarna), 5 Adrien Goguet (F - Husaberg), 6 Ales Hlad (BUL - KTM), 7 Davide Gozzini (I - TM), 8 Petr Vorlicek (CZ - Suzuki), 9 Chris HODGSON (GB - KTM), 10 Angel Grau (E - Husaberg), 11 Jean-Marc Gaillard (B - Honda), 12 Ola Eifrem (S - Suzuki), 13 Uros Nastran (SLO - Husqvarna), 14 Xavier Rodriguez (E - Honda), 15 Silvester Habat (SLO Jun - Honda), 16 Jan Deitenbach (D - Suzuki), 17 Ville Jauhiainen (SF - Husaberg), 18 Toni Klem (SF Jun - Husqvarna), 19 David Brabec (CZ - Yamaha), 20 George CLEMENTS (GB Jun - Husqvarna), 21 Nico Joannidis (D - Suzuki), 22 Iztok Zivko (SLO Jun - Yamaha), 23 Vincent Paquet (B - KTM), 24 Lee WILLIAMS (GB Jun - KTM), 25 Teemu Lang (SF Jun - Husaberg), 26 Ari Astedt (SF - Yamaha), 27 Jernej Gomboc (SLO - Yamaha), 28 Jorgen Huvell (S - Honda).
NATIONS STANDINGS (After Race 1): 1 Italy 8 points, 2 Bulgaria 8, 3 France 9, 4 GREAT BRITAIN 12, 5 Spain 24, 6 Czech Republic 27, 7 Belgium 34, 8 Slovenia Junior 37, 9 Germany 37, 10 Sweden 40, 11 Slovenia 40, 12 Finland 43, 13 Finland Junior 43, 14 GREAT BRITAIN JUNIOR 44.
RACE TWO (S2/Open): 1 Gozzini (I), 2 HODGSON (GB), 3 Goguet (F), 4 Attilio Pignotti (I - KTM), 5 Jiri Bocek (CZ - Honda), 6 Rosen Tonchev (BUL - KTM), 7 Stephane Blot (F - Yamaha), 8 Dirk Spaniol (D - Suzuki), 9 Ronny Fryns (B - Honda), 10 Hlad (BUL), 11 Rok Mihelcic (SLO - Honda), 12 Habat (SLO Jun), 13 Christian Nilsson (S - Yamaha), 14 Kalle Toronen (SF Jun - Honda), 15 Brabec (CZ), 16 Ady SMITH (GB - KTM), 17 Oliver POPE (GB Jun - KTM), 18 Joannidis (D), 19 Jauhiainen (SF), 20 CLEMENTS (GB Jun), 21 Paquet (B), 22 Lang (SF Jun), 23 Jan Habat (SLO Jun - KTM), 24 Albert Roca Rubirola (E - Aprilia), 25 Grau (E), 26 Gomboc (SLO), 27 Jussi Vehvilainen (SF - Husqvarna), 28 Huvell (S).
NATIONS (After Race 2): 1 Italy 13 points, 2 France 19, 3 Bulgaria 24, 4 GREAT BRITAIN 30, 5 Czech Republic 47, 6 Sweden 53, 7 Germany 63, 8 Belgium 64, 9 Slovenia Junior 72, 10 Spain 73, 11 Slovenia 77, 12 Finland Junior 79, 13 GREAT BRITAIN JUNIOR 81, 14 Finland 89.
RACE THREE (S1/Open): 1 Bidart (F), 2 WINSTANLEY (GB), 3 Lazzarini (I), 4 Pignotti (I), 5 Bocek (CZ), 6 Rodriguez (E), 7 Georgiev (BUL), 8 Tonchev (BUL), 9 Deitenbach (D), 10 Fryns (B), 11 Spaniol (D), 12 Blot (F), 13 Vorlicek (CZ), 14 Nastran (SLO), 15 SMITH (GB), 16 Mihelcic (SLO), 17 Toronen (SF Jun), 18 Klem (SF Jun), 19 Eifrem (S), 20 Gaillard (B), 21 Rubirola (E), 22 POPE (GB Jun), 23 Zivko (SLO Jun), 24 Vehvilainen (SF), 25 WILLIAMS (GB Jun), 26 Habat (SLO Jun), 27 Astedt (SF), 28 Nilsson (S).
For full report see T+MX News, Friday, October 4, 2008
Sylvain Bidart (France) and Matt Winstanley, try as he did Matt couldn't get past Bidart and the French ace went on to win the S1/Open class.