At 10am on Sunday 9 April the first 3 championship riders from the 121 starters were eagerly flagged away on their initial 11 mile lap of the Hustyn Enduro run by the Camel Vale Motorcycle Club. Starting rather steadily as these top class riders had a total of nearly 90 miles to ride - and all off-road, before their race would be over!

Fraser's luck ran out on the 1st special test.

I will add a little background information for those readers not familiar with a classic enduro: Being a timecard enduro, each class had its own number of laps for riders to complete within a specific time. At the start of the day this is often at a more relaxed pace until the competitors get used to the track - which at eleven miles per check, can take a lot of learning!

Fast GA wheely's his way to 5th place.

Hence the Champ boys had 39 minutes to complete their first lap and all made it okay. But by the end of the day this had been cut down to only 24 minutes for those still remaining - and the race pace of these top riders was awesome!

Arriving at time checks late incurs a 60 second penalty for every minute the rider is behind time. In case they all riders make it okay - which would produce a tie, instead of a winner, there are always a special high speed test sections thrown in. Each second a rider is on the special stage produces a 1 second penalty - which is often the amount that decides the winner.

So as you can imagine the speeds on the tests get pretty furious - with no rider wanting to lose points. Even so there were some surprising upsets early on in the day; Wayne Mundell went out early with an injured leg. Mr 'Almost unbeatable' Jason Fraser, decked his big Berg in the first test, and a flying Bradley Williams actually caught Carl Mcllroy - who is normally one of the fastest - and he had started the test 15 seconds in front!

A short tarmac stretch helped riders get a brief rest.

As usual the Dustow brothers Steve and Chris were pushing each other to the limits and both posted first test times within 0.4 seconds of each other, at 7 mins 33.5 secs for Steve and 7 mins 33.9 sces for Chris!

A hapless rider lies down in the woods!

The real flyer on the first test however was Nick Life with a 07:22.9 test time. On test 2 & 3 Seve Dustow responded with a 07:14.2 and 07:13.7 to Nick's 07:21.8 and 07:16.0, but this was not quite enough to snatch back the difference from lap one. And left Nick Life the victor on the day taking the premier from a trailing Steve Dustow lying in second spot only 0.7 seconds behind after over 4 hours of tough racing!

Of course there was gorse.

Also keen to make their presence felt, the Expert class riders were going hard at it flat out on the tests to try and grab their own win. Over zealousness however caused pre race favourite Steven Jewell to drop it on the test and young Jamie Paget to actually stalled his bike - this was not the place to do it!

A walk on the high side!!!

Race organiser Mike Roose had marked out a long x-country test with a good mixture of going. This year much of the extra length that was added was fairly tight and technical, which obviously suited some more than others.

Tree roots caught out many riders.

At the two hour mark a few riders had dropped out with various problems, No111 Pete Gregory had bust a radiator when the bike hit something it shouldn't have and an unlucky Adrian Bence No95 had a nasty spill which resulted in him breaking a wrist. A well organised Ambulance team guided by the Camel Vale club sprang into action and got him safely on his way to hospital without even having to halt the race.

The biggest shock upset of the day was sadly a rather horrid crash when Max Hembooke's bike jittered off course down a very fast fire break. He had just passed Shaun Dayman when his KTM appeared to suddenly twitch and veer off up along a bank until it impacted with a short tree stump - which snapped the complete front end off the bike. As championship riders arrived at the scene they were paled at the sight of bike bits literally everywhere and seeing Max who was in a lot of pain and obviously seriously hurt during the sudden impact. But Shaun Dayman had already raised the alarm with the CVMCC officials and the air ambulance was on its way.

Deep grass leading to dark woods.

Max spent 2 nights in intensive care as hospital staff monitored his condition carefully as it was feared he had bruised his heart and damaged other vital organs. But luckily tough as good enduro riders usually are, Max is now said to be in a 'comfortable condition'.

I have since heard from Mike Roose that Max was pleased to see the race results when they were taken in for him, but sad that he didn't get a better finish himself.

I have been asked to pass thanks to Shaun Dayman for all his help during the incident.

Riders relaxing in the pits at the finish commented on how much they had enjoyed riding the big and varied Hustyn track - which is now a bit of a rarity in the Westcountry! So well done to Mike and the Camel Vale team for all their hard work in putting on such a great event.

Pete Gregory before he bust the radiator.