We were offered the use again at AMCA Bevercotes for our 8th round Championship Trial, it’s a couple of years since we last used the area around the Motocross circuit, and the passage of time and track management reduced the potential to find the previous locations that had made for the ten interesting and challenging sections that we had anticipated, in fact, Mark Francis, Shane Lockley and myself found it very hard to come up with the eight that were the final choice for Sunday. We also considered the long-range weather forecast that indicated that we were in for a wet day, which didn’t arrive until we were ready to pack up and head home.

48 riders signed on for five laps of eight sections, seven riders managed to keep clean sheets all day. That being, 4 Expert and 3 Inter-route riders, with the majority of the seven on Pre-Unit bikes. Section 5 took the majority of the days marks, it looked easier when we set it out than it actually rode: a gentle down hill start with a tight left turn into a up-hill twisting gully that needed riding with pace, the majority of the marks were lost on the turn into the gully, Diane Guy observing here was kept busy with nearly 40% of the days marks lost here!

Alan Marin-Andrew showed that he was getting back into form with a single dab on the Clubman route, also sad to see Zac Coupland retire with chain issues after riding well for the majority of the day, The entry for our next event should now be open and I would ask you to get your entry form and payment over to me asap, its less then 2 weeks to the Trial at Henbeck on the 2nd of November.

And finally thank you all, observers and riders that joined in our minutes silence for Jean Witting, one of our long standing observers and wife of Stuart, she will be sadly missed, we also took the opportunity to remember Malc Wheeler ex TT Racer and Poachers Trials rider who had a celebration of his life at Cadwell Park earlier this month.

Jean’s funeral is on the 27th of October @ Woodlands Crematorium, Scunthorpe at 1.20pm, I think Daid Hird will have more up to date information, contact 07779 931022.

Thank you for your support of our Club and we look forward to seeing you all at our penultimate Championship Trial at Henbeck. MG

Grey skies and early morning rain didn’t discourage the 66 riders that singed on for our first Championship Trial since our summer break. It was relatively low scoring in view of the conditions but Parkinsons Farm flanks the Viking Way that has a high concentration of Sandstone within the sections.

On the Expert route sections 2 and 4 observed by Brenda McGregor and Course setter Errol Gowshall were responsible for extracting marks into triple figures over the four laps and were easily the hardest sections of the Trial. Inter-50/50 riders lost most of their marks riding the eased version on section 4 which was a Sandy Bank with a tight climb to the Ends Cards. Sections 8 and 9, which were Hard route sections for inter riders also extracted a high proportion of marks. On the Clubman route again Errol’s section proved to be the one that was the spoiler, nevertheless most of our Clubman riders went home with very commendable single figure scores.

Our next Trial is only two and a half weeks away, and it will be to the west of our normal footprint, we have asked the AMCA for permission to use the land that surrounds the old scrambles course at Bevercoates, I should receive the permit in the next few days and we will open the entry as soon as possible, last time we used this venue it was in the heights of the summer and the ground was very hard, especially on the hill climbs. So hopefully our visit in October will be the perfect time of the Year. I will do my best to get W3Words for the venue, if not then the postcode.

Thanks for your support of Poachers Pre65 Trials, especially to the riders that make long journeys to our venues, John Wilkinson has produced another excellent set of pictures, you should be able to find them on his Facebook page. MG

42 riders made it over to the venue just off the Sleaford to Grantham Road at Hanbeck for our first summer Trial. The free to members event was planned as a thank you to our riders for their support over the year and as compensation for the enforced cancellation of the non-Championship event at Wrights Farm. Sunday’s event was also a non-Championship Trial, but weeks of dry weather made the sandy sections as slippery as the muddy streams in the winter that makes this such a challenging venue.

The Expert route was won by Rob Poulter who managed to part with just one mark on section 6, his nearest single figure rival in 2nd place was Pre-unit expert rider, Mark Hawkins on his Ariel losing 8 marks very closely followed by Mick James on 10 marks lost.

Intermediate and Clubman results were the hardest to evaluate. With only a handful of 33 riders that made up the remaining classes finishing on single figures. Faultless rides from Intermediate supremos, Ash and Spencer, who didn’t drop a mark, New comer and pre-Unit rider for the first time, Jamie Moss lost his single mark on section 8, John Stevenson lost 2 on section 6 and Mike Crawford succumbed to a handful of dabs over 4 sections, all tremendous achievements in view of the high scoring results from the day.

It was good to see Curtis Connolly, who has been a regular visitor to Poachers Trials out on his very original looking Francis Barrnett, this was Curtis’s first event, and we look forward to seeing him again at forthcoming Trials.

We again thank Carl and Mark for allowing us free use of the venue and welcome any feedback, either on the Clubs “Facebook” page or via email to enteries@belton-4.co.uk

We will be posting in advance of the next Championship Trial in September the UpToDate standings and we hope to be able to open the entry for the Parkinsons Farm Trial at some point next week. MG.

76 riders signed on for our 6th Round Championship Trial, conditions were hot and dry, and the sections rode well. We did experience a degree of queuing, especially at sections 1 and 7, which we think resulted in riders avoiding the queue and moving onto the next section, sadly resulting in several missed sections on the observer’s sheets, which have been indicated on the results as red 5’s. As always, we can only use the marks on the observer’s sheets in formatting scores. In saying that, we hope that you understand our actions and hope for those concerned it’s not too much of a disappointment. MG

66 riders signed on for the event in May, we were blessed with a warm, clear sunny day for eight sections to be ridden over 5 laps with most of the sections set on the steep hillside that runs the length of the venue. It was this area that proved to be the mark taker with section 3, the long steep down hill drop with a sharp right turn at the bottom, which sent riders up the cambered bank, which was then flagged left to drop to the end’s cards. The steep drop and sharp right turn caused the majority of marks to be dropped, especially on the Clubman route. Then on to section 5, Diane observed this gem! Ironically, I set this one out with Nick Neave, and did she have to work hard for her observers draw winnings! The only rider on the expert and Intermediate route not to drop a mark here was Mark Hawkins riding his Ariel on the perfect line on each visit. In fact, the top 4 placed riders on the Expert Route all riding big Pre Unit bikes returned the best scores at this section, an excellent achievement. 

We also started the entry off in groups depending on which class you rode, this was to reduce the queues, I would welcome your feed back via the Clubs Facebook page or a quick email to me at sales@belton-4.co.uk with any comments. I think the day went according to plan and we hope you enjoyed the trial at Flintwood, a bit tougher than planned, but we think that it’s worth the entry fee for the views alone!  John Wilkinson has posted a set of pictures mainly from section 8, I think more are in the pipeline.

Thank you for supporting our Trials, our next event on the 1st of June is a round of the Northern British Bike Championship, “The Reliance Cup Trial, a road trial set in and around Buxton. Entry Forms will be open soon on our entry page, with more information to follow. Closer to home our next Championship Trial is set for the 29th of June at South Elkington, we look forward to seeing you all there. MG     

Thank you to all the riders that entered the Good Friday Trial, 58 riders signed on for 5 laps of 8 sections, with a few modified Poachers Bag section thrown in for good measure which resulted in a high scoring day, taxing but nothing dangerous, so with that in mind is hats off to the four Expert Route riders and one Clubman route rider that finished the day on single figures. Over the next few days we will be updating the Championship positions in advance of our next event.

It’s a big thank you to all our observers, also thanks to Mark Francis, Nick Neave and John Guy for their time on Wednesday setting out the sections for us.

Our next Trial is on the 11th of May at Flintwood Farm the excellent venue just outside Belchford, I will have the entry open as soon as possible. Finally, just next to my signing on table was a Bantam frame, we aren’t sure if it was “For Sale” or not, or perhaps just looking for a new owner, anyway Ian Wilkinson has it safe, if you could message me if you know anything about it.

Thank you for your support, and we look forward to seeing you all soon. MG

We are pleased to attach a set of results for our 3rd round Championship Trial at Syston, Mark, Francis and Boswell along with John Guy, Nick Neave and Patrick Sewell set out 10 sections ridden over 4 laps. Sections 1-4 set in the wooded bowl at the far end of the venue were a nice selection of climbs and descents around the trees, sections 5 to 10 were set around the stream area of the venue with section 7, a high climb around a tree with a steep drop into the stream leading to a harder exit for the Expert and Inter riders with a slightly eased exit on the Clubman route….this section provide to be the mark taker for the day, yet in saying that we did have a good selection, 4 in fact remaining clean with 29 riders on single figures. Which out of 76 riders that started the event is a pretty good ratio of getting it set just about right!

We were blessed with a bright sunny day at this excellent venue which made the time spent queuing at section 7 a good opportunity to catch up with fellow riders, we thank all the riders that made the journey over to perhaps one of our most westerly venues. The observer’s prize was won by Ruby on section 7, so thank you all for your contributions to the collection. Look forward to seeing you all next time. MG