pete_scorpa3

Plus it's not too far for you to get over to the all year round practice venue at Earl Shilton. www.estc.co.uk

You are spoilt for choice where you live. There are a number of clubs that provide excellent club trials, all with two or even three routes which will be perfect for a Twinshock bike. Infact, you can ride almost every weekend without traveling too far. Stourbridge, Bewdley, Dudley, Evesham, Stafford Auto and ourselves at Stratford, to mention a few. As for practicing, the Stourbridge club use a venue at Shatterford near Kidderminster and I am told riders can turn up there and practice for a fee. I hope this helps. Pete

The Osets are brilliant for teaching throttle control, you can set the speed right down to crawling pace and build it up from there. Full face helmets are certainly the safest thing to go for but they are heavy for a little one and do restrict their vision, I made the descision to give them open face lids for this reason but my two both ride their bikes like trials rather than MX bikes. I hope it's not a descision thatb I live to regret. The batteries last for about two hours ridden along a cycle path with me on my push bike, but they last for four to five hours at a trial where the rider spends much of the time walking the sections or waiting ain a queue. The Osets are perfect for what I want them to do and it's allowed by eldest to start competing a year early with 2 1/2 years riding experience already. Thank you Oset.

A brilliant buy, I've bought both. My girls both started riding at 2 1/2 years old with stabilisers. The older one now has a 16" and loves it, she is just five and has ridden in around ten trials this year. All thanks to the Oset electric bikes. I can't speak highly enough about them.

I agree, 2psi does make a noticeable difference. I run a Mich on the front of my Scorpa and an IRC on the rear with 6/4 psi.

The trials registration runs from 1st Jan to the 31st Dec. If you've got the correct form, the address is on the bottom. Remember to get a club to sign the form and send a photo with your first application. The Auto Cycle Union, ACU House, Wood Street, Rugby. CV21 2YX

I initially liked your idea but having given some thought to the point scoring system needed, I don't think it would work. Having the same riders riding in various different events would work quite well, but having one rider in one event and another in a different one would make a points scoring system irrelevant. The severity of each trial would never be the same, even the finishing order would not bear any relevance as one event might attract better riders than another. Is it not possible to get all the interested parties to agree on a set number of events that they could all ride in? This would make a championship a meaningful one. Only my thoughts on the idea. Pete

I took my eldest daughter to the show this year and we had a marvelous time, she loved the trick riding demo, the mini bike racing complete with amazing back flips, the free quad bikes and most of all the free climbing wall. But her favourite thing was standing on her dream bike. I only came away with a dvd, so I guess the cost of the whole day made it a very expensive disc, but it was worth every penny to have a great day out.

My daughter is a very small five year old and has just started wearing a proper helmet. Although it does not provide as much protection as a mx lid, it does give a lot more all round protection than a push bike helmet. She tried on a number of different makes and the Wulf Airflo Adult Trials in XS fits her very well indeed. It was

It's not just the South of the Centre that suffers with this, it's a problem in general for any club near the centre boundary but easier said than done. We try not to clash with clubs like the CHG, Oxford Ixion and ESTC, all good clubs within easy travelling distance of our venues but in three different centres. We managed to hold a club trial this year that clashed with two of these clubs plus fathers day plus F1 plus MotoGP. I'm amazed that anyone turned up at all!! Won't use that date again!!!

I'd be very suprised if they were different.

I am looking at chainging the colour of my daughters 16" Oset as she would like a more girly colour, I was wondering is anyone has tried spraying a trials bike mudguard? Is there a paint that is flexible enough to stay on without cracking? Pete

We dropped the Centre championship Group trial this year as it was a lot of work for no more riders than we would have got at a simple 'enter on the day' club trial. It was soul destroying to have 30 riders pre-enter and bring along their share of observers for another 20 to turn up on the day with no need to bring an observer only to find that we were short. (There is a requirment for each club to supply 1 observer for every five riders.) Plus, we also ran three routes to cater for the 'less able' riders, without which it wouldn't be worth staging the event anyway. Even for our three round club championship, we only had 16 riders do all three rounds this year, many only entered one trial out of the three. It's an unfortunate (for clubs) fact that people want to pick and choose and decide on the day where and if they ride. As organisers we just have to resign ourselves to that and do our best to cater for all levels of ability and hope that enough riders enter to make our efforts worthwhile. I feel for the Bewdley club having to cancel the trial, we've not had to do that in the past (not due to poor enties that is) although I did run a 40 section road trial with only 32 riders a few years back!

Back to that old chestnut, many think it's too hard for the easy route. Easy trials get good entries and the centre championships by their nature aren't easy. Sorry to hear the Hooper trial has been cancelled, how many emtries did you have? Pete

Perhaps a bespoke factory WTC machine was not the best choice of machine for the event. A F1 racing car is the fastest thing around a race track but you wouldn't use it to go on holiday in. I bet the Lampkin team has lots of bikes tucked away in the workshop from years ago that would have done the job ok, but then hind sight is a wonderful thing. Terribly frustrating for all concerned.

Not engine but well worth stripping the rear suspension apart and regreasing, once these go dry they fail quickly and cost a lot to replace. Pete

It's been at least six years since the Beta brand name began to suffer following numerous elecrical issues on their trials bikes. There is no mention of stators being Dougies problem, but why would it suprise anyone that it happened? Private customers by the 100 maybe 1000's have had the problem and the factory hasn't resolved it, surely that should have been enough motivation to cure the fault if they were ever going to? Two faulty stators in six trials lost Beta my custom, perhaps forever. Still perhaps it was another problem, there is no official mention of what electrical issue it was. Pete

Duct tape has kept many generations of club road racers on the track. Scrutineers will fail you for having the wrong radius on a lever, but the magical powers of duct tape appears to make them miss the rest of the bike held together with a hope and a prayer and a few strips of tape. Thank you duct tape

To ride in a road trial and comply with the law, the helmet (and goggles if used)must be road legal. The ACU handbook simply states that a motorcycle helmet must be worn. I have no idea what the legal definition of a motorcycle helmet would be, but I guess being road legal wouldn't come into it if the course was all off road.

The ACU handbook just states that for trials a motorcycle helmet must be correctly worn. It doesn't say that it has to be ACU approved unlike for all other disciplines.

That was my impression too. Jumping off my Scorpa onto a 290 Evo (with soft setting switched on) the Evo power felt just like my Scorpa until about 1/3 throttle, after that it was a different story but the bottom end is superb. I could ride a whole event without using more than 1/3 throttle, perhaps that is a waste but it's the bike I would buy if I was looking to change.

My daughter likes riding her trials bike more than anything else (although rock climbing comes a close second) she is just getting to the stage where she needs good brakes but being a very small five year old, her little hands can't apply much pressure on the brake lever. I've tried various ways to improve the brakes but have now 'bitten the bullet' and fitted a twin piston hydraulic system. The Clark Skeletal system is designed for mountain bikes and offers impressive adjustments on the lever for both reach and span. It also comes with a 185mm wavy disc and allows even Jess to use just one finger on the brakes. I was pleasantly suprised when it took just 10 minutes to fit and a few seconds to adjust. Not cheap but well worth considering if your rider isn't very strong. Pete

Graham reads TC but does not have an account, so he has asked me to point out that the email address above is wrong. His correct email address is- graham.harrison26@o2.co.uk He also says that he is more than happy to help out. I hope this helps. Pete

The Stratford-Upon-Avon MCC are running a club trial at Hancocks Wood near Broadway on Sunday 17th October with a seperate conducted route specifically aimed at riders with class E licences on Oset electric trials bikes. The normal club trial will include three routes plus the additional two routes for small wheel machines at the top of the wood near to the car park area. The Easy conducted route will be suitable for youngsters aged 4 to 6 years old with the Hard conducted route suitable for more experienced riders on machines such as TY80's. Trophies will be presented to the top three on each route at the end of the trial. The event begins at 10.30 am and is signposted from the A44 at the top of Fish Hill Broadway. Conducted riders entry fee is just