Summer Series Round 1 Report

Forty seven brave riders entered the first round of the highly popular Ringwood Summer Series at Ashley Hollow near Ringwood. With the sun due to go down at ten past eight there is always a mad dash around the woods to complete the three laps of eight sections before ‘lights out’. With less than a lap of the trial completed the heavens opened and the riders and marshalls Summer Evening competition became a bit more challenging.

2022 Summer Series Expert Champion Ben Lovelace continued his excellent Ringwood form with a clean trial but if it wasn’t for two early slack dabs by Oli Gray the results could have been closer. Some interesting new sections were used for the first time with a ‘limbo’ style section catching  Gray for one of his dabs, on some routes ducking down to go under a branch the front wheel came up over a bump which caught a few riders out. Gary Tarrant is returning to good form after his injury last August, he topped the Clubman class on nine, five ahead of Derek Francis and eight ahead of Summer Series regular Graham Harrison. In Youth B Adam Kilbey had a good ride using his local knowledge to finish well ahead of David James. On the C route Kev Downer rode his new Beta to top sportsman on nine, instead of riding his multiple winning Fantic, he lost a five on the last lap on section 5 where there was a tricky log halfway up a narrow climb which got more slippery as the evening wore on. Shamus Doohan and Mark Read were five and six marks back. On the D route Mike Jarrett was clean topping the Pre 65 Novice class on his B40 BSA seven ahead of Andy Withers who’s score was equalled by Lloyd James who was the best in the main novice class. Twinshock winner Mike Popperwell lost all his eight marks on section 2 and 8 where sliding off tricky ledges accounted for many losses. 

There are four more rounds to come of this excellent series on Thursday evenings starting at 6.30p.m. there will be more light and less rain as the series goes on? 

Results - Top Three

Experts: Ben Lovelace (GasGas) 0, Oli Gray (Beta) 2, Ben Harrison (Beta) 15

Clubman: Gary Tarrant (GasGas) 9, Derek Francis (TRS) 14, Graham Harrison (Beta) 17

Youth B: Adam Kilbey (Beta) 44, David James (GasGas) 73, Bay Robinson (GasGas) 77

Sportsman: Kev Downer (Beta) 9, Shamus Doohan (TRS) 14, Mark Read (Beta) 15

Pre65 Sportsman: John Miles (Triumph) 23

Novice :Lloyd James (Honda) 7, Gary Sainsbury (Scorpa) 22, Mike Orr (Montesa) 49

Pre65 Novice: Mike Jarratt (BSA) 0, Andy Withers (BSA) 7, Trev Newell (Royal Enfield) 16

Twinshock Novice: Mike Popperwell (Honda) 8, Phil Jones (Yamaha) 23, Geoff Parker (Fantic) 31

Youth D: Ollie Barr (TRS) 38

Thank you to Andy Withers / Awsportsphoto for the report and pictures.

Entries see - acu.org.uk

Photographs: see awsportsphoto@gmail.com