The second round of the TBEC Enduro championship at Stonebury was originally scheduled for April 2nd, but torrential rain fell during the preceding fortnight to swamp the pit area, forcing the organisers to postpone the meeting for a week. Those seven short but sunny days transformed the soil into perfect pit area conditions and the 3 hour enduro went ahead as planned on Easter Sunday.
Report and Images by Roger Allen
By comparison to previous TBEC venues, the circuit was a much more compact course of just under 6 miles, but expertly thought out by the organisers, and which included stubble fields, part woodland, some flat out stuff and with a nadgery little technical section on waste land thrown in immediately after the start. Most of the top Elite group had placed themselves in group ‘zero’ which was first off the mark at 10.30am prompt. After clearing the blue tape safety area, defending champ Toby Bailey shot off like a bullet with the GasGas of Phil Gilder contesting the first corner alongside him. Bailey forced his two stroke KTM ahead as both disappeared into the wasteland section with him emerging on his own having opened up a six second gap. The next group departed one minute later with Copt Hall first-round runner-up, Paul Hanks, clearing off on his four stroke Husky 350 in pursuit of the front runners. Following on at one minute intervals, but in no particular order, came the E1, E2 and E3 groups, the under 21, Vets, TRL, HG and LEG groups.
As the first lap drew to a close, the first to break cover from the woodland, as expected, was the orange outfit of defending 2022 TBEC champion Toby Bailey on his seven year old XC300. He was out on his own and obviously on a mission, posting a very quick opening lap time of 10’47”. Elite rider Dan Smith came around in second place, with a lap time of 11’04”, just 17 seconds adrift with the rest of the field panned out behind them. Half way through the enduro, pit stops were frenetic but it was noticeable that both Smith (GasGas) and Hanks (Husqvarna) were on a one-stop strategy with their four strokes, while leader Bailey was forced to stop twice to replenish his thirsty KTM two stroke. This made the outcome very exciting, as it brought Cheltenham man Bailey back within challenging distance of Smith and Hanks. By the time the three hours was up, Bailey was the only one to record 17 laps but gave up 9 penalty points for being 3 minutes over. Even so, he posted the fastest lap time of the day at 10 minutes 22 seconds, while Smith, Luke Evans and Hanks were close behind and finished in that order after recording 16 laps. Egan Bruley put up a spirited performance to head the Vets class, Paul Hunt topped the E3 class with young Finlay Woods showing his potential by taking the under-21 class. All in all it was a great Enduro and the TBEC team did a fine job in preparing the circuit. In the Championship though, with two wins out of two under his belt, it looks as though Bailey will take a lot of stopping if he’s to be prevented from retaining the title this year!
The next TBEC round is due to be held at Abbotsley Arena in Cambridgeshire on 14th May.
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