Addingham Moorside, last years’ British venue for the World Trial is not the best place to be at the beginning of February but for Yorkshire Classic’s 2nd Championship trial, a calm, dry and relatively warm day greeted the 64 riders taking part.
Clerks of Course, Colin Pawson and Dale Harrison had braved the winds and rain of Saturday to make 10 challenging sections on the rocky hillside to test everyone with only Tony Calvert going clean on the day, closely followed by Ben Butterworth on 1, Paul Preston on 2, and Rob Bratley on 4. With Paul on a round-barrel vintage James and Rob on his Dad, Ken’s old Francis Barnet for the first time, both had excellent rides followed by Nick Jefferies and Vesty (Yrjo Vesterinen), being the only others on single figure scores.
Sections 6,8 and 9 took marks from the majority with Ben losing his only mark on 6 along a rocky path with tight left turn into the stream and tight right up to the finish. Only Paul Preston, John Maxfield and George Emmott joined Tony on clean here. A gentle start through the rocks at section 8 turned into a much tougher rock gulley with only Rob Shepherd joining the first 4 on clean. The most difficult section of the day turned out to be 9 with only the single figure riders staying clean apart from Rob Bratley, who lost 2 of his marks here. Starting with a gentle downhill over rock slabs, a tight left turn over spaced out slabs needed accurate positioning to succeed.
For the 11 riders on the Intermediate Route, section 1, with its tricky start over spaced out rocks needed some speed and accurate positioning, with only Neil Buckley and Steve Rayner staying clean. Section 2, with its tight turn and big rock step to the end caught everyone with Dale Harrison best on 1. Best on Section 4, up the hillside to a finish over a steep rock face, were Neil Buckley, Pete McCanna and Richard Bainbridge, each on 1. Next came Section 7, a long winding run up the hillside, part stream, part grass banking, getting muddier as the day went on with Dave Brogden and Richard Bainbridge best on 3. Eventual winner, Steve Gossop was the only clean on section 10, with its steep banking to exit ending up as a very deep groove.
On the eased Clubman Route, Brian Cooper led the way on 2, followed by Mick Whitlow and Keith Normington. Again Section 2, with its rock step, caught everyone except Brian and Mick. The eased version of Section 7 took marks from all Clubmen, except Colin Benson, with the grassy bankings cutting up as the day went on.
Our thanks go to the Landowner, Clerks of Course, Observers, Riders, Spectators and Barry Pickard for photos and results and everyone for an excellent day on the Moor.