Squadron comes good at Moelfre BDS!

With the recent departure of Lee it was down to Andy, Mitch and Elliot to fly the flag for The Squadron at Moelfre. This was round 4 of the British Downhill Series on a much modified track. Being Moelfre the weather was its usual mixed bag – Saturday was breezy with intermittent showers, eventually forcing most riders to get out the cut spikes or similar. Although the track had changed significantly from previous years it was fairly straight forward to learn – which was just as well as Elliot didn’t arrive at the venue until gone 2 o’clock! The uplift service was pretty good (at least until one of the drivers managed to put a tractor on its side) enabling Mitch to bang out about 15 runs in rapid succession with Andy not far behind. That’s enthusiasm!

Sunday dawned rain free thankfully, and with a rapidly drying track riders were reverting back to High Rollers or Minions. The guys put in 2 or 3 runs to familiarise themselves with the new conditions then it was down to the serious business of qualifying runs – or it would have been if some riders hadn’t started to crash in alarming numbers! The Air Ambulance was called out twice within a couple of hours resulting in horrendous delays – so much so that seeding runs were eventually abandoned! As far as I’m aware this is the first time such a situation has arisen. It’s easy to blame the organisers but in reality it’s the Paramedics that make the decision to call in the helicopters. Are they becoming to risk conscious? Maybe. The fact is one of the “injured” riders was able to walk to the side of the track and hold a conversation with the medics. Make up you own mind.

Back to the racing. Mitch was first away in the Juniors, breaking the beam in a very respectable 2:42.236. This was good enough for 10^th place, not only that but he was just 4 seconds of the winners time. Considering this is Mitch’s first season of downhill racing that is a remarkable achievement that bodes well for the future.  

Next off was Andy in the Senior Category. It would be fair to say Andy hasn’t exactly had the best luck so far this season. Basically he was looking for a good solid result, and that’s exactly what he got. 24^th place in a field of 63 Seniors is good going by anybody’s standards.  2:48.230 was his time and that was with a bit left in the tank. It also bagged him 27 BC Ranking Points. Let’s hope Andy can build on this result and break into the top 20.

Elliot was feeling “quietly confident” before the race , despite his late arrival, and this proved to be well founded – 4^th place in The Experts was a great result – his first BDS podium (National races have five man podiums) and a real boost to his National Ranking. His time of 2:37.173 was a well earned reward for all the hard work and training he has put in.

All in all a great week end for the team. No injuries, no serious mechanicals and with one more round of the BDS to go (Caersws) there’s everything to play for. 

-Paul Machin