British 2-Stroke Championship Report

James Noble and Jim Davies came away victorious from round four of the Fuchs Silkolene British 2-Stroke Championships, but it wasn’t plain sailing even for the overall winners. The weather had been kind during the lead-up to the event and the bowsers were watering the track as of Saturday evening, but a heavy squall bought torrential rain and gales to the Cornish race track at about half three on Sunday morning, the horrendous conditions sticking about throughout the morning before the sun managed to break through and turned the track from barely rideable into almost perfect.

Lloyd Morgan was the fastest man out of the gate in the first 125 A moto, although Luke Dean briefly poked a front wheel ahead of the Welshman through turn one. Tim Heasman paddled his way into second as Jim Davies overcame a rubbish start to end the first lap in an astonishing third after dodging a massive pileup after the lengthy first turn that saw the fast-starting Mark Bland and his TM buried beneath an avalanche of bikes and riders. This early on, the track was still fairly hard-packed with a layer of slippery, brown, greasy water over it, which meant that conditions were both treacherous and blinding. With a decent start, Morgan was straight past Dean into the lead and immediately had a massive advantage as everyone behind instantly got filled in.

Jake Page had Dave Willet for company as they battled for fourth place on the opening lap, but the sloppy condition rendered everyone else more or less unrecognizable further back. By lap two, Morgan was a mile down the road ahead of Davies and Willet as the pack spread out, conditions so bad that there were fallers everywhere and every lap was just a series of mistakes and incidents strung together. But although Morgan was able to extend his gap, so that he entered the final lap with an advantage of around twenty seconds, Willet had been relentlessly sneaking up on Davies, crossing the line maybe two seconds in arrears. As the pair hit backmarkers, it seemed like Davies had enough in hand to take second, but Willet summoned up something special to make an impossible pass somewhere in the final yards before the finish for second place.

Race two was all set for more of the same, with Morgan leading from Ash Harland, Darren Redman, Tim Heasman, Dan Arnold and Davies, but Morgan would early on drop the KTM in a nasty-looking spill after a high-speed downhill drop-off. Straight up and back into the fray in seventh, the Welshman seemed a tad dazed and was unable to regain his former speed. Harland took over the lead but within a handful of laps he was heading backward with a blown shock as Arnold went into battle with Redman and Davies, the three of them trailing Heasman. As the trio eased up on the leader, Heasman was aware of what was to come: charging downhill towards a hairpin, Heasman knew he had Arnold trailing him to the outside and delayed his entry as much as he could to prevent Arnold from cutting back beneath him, but the wily LPE Kawasaki rider just waited until Heasman was committed before changing his line to challenge for the lead. Their shenanigans allowed Davies to join the fun and he was soon into second but Arnold was in fine form, edging away for the win.

Race three was epic - Sean Stevens led from Morgan, Redman, Davies and Heasman with Arnold down in seventh, but former schoolboy ace Stevens had the closing pack right on his tail with Morgan all over him. Davies made his way through the pack, taking the lead on lap five as he passed Stevens behind the start line, but Arnold was starting to move further back, up to fourth by this point before Stevens and Morgan dropped down the field, leaving Davies and Arnold to battle for the win. Arnold slowly snuck up before making a move on the inside of the corner before the whoops, sneaking out a win with barely a lap and a half left but it was Davies who took the overall victory.

The Open A class was a two-horse race all day long: Right from the start of race one, Luke Hill took holeshots for fun on the mighty Service Honda CR500, but Scott Elderfield and James Noble were always right there and were the class of the field on pure pace. Mark Eastwood was neck-and-neck with Hill into the first turn for race one, but the reigning champion got pushed wide within a couple of corners, allowing Elderfield and Matthew White through. Dave Willet was sixth behind Noble away from the start but a small off on lap one cost him a few places, and another crash a handful of laps later left the Yamaha rider on the sidelines in some discomfort and he was to play no further part in the day’s proceedings, making the day sadly remarkable because the Ironman normally plays a major part in every A race. Noble was quickly into third as Elderfield began to mount a serious challenge for the lead, the British championship frontrunners moving into the first two places with Hill dropping down into a comfortable third. Noble had the edge on pace, though, driving past Elderfield into a lead he held to the flag ahead of Elderfield, Hill, White and Eastwood. Hill got the holeshot in race two as well but Elderfield and Noble were through into first and second before the end of the lap, Tony Cuddy and White holding fourth and fifth.