LAMEROO CAMP 20-21/5/06

After a cold night around the campfire the 5 riders were joined by 3 more in the morning for a cool day’s ride. Straight in to the whoops soon had us warmed up. Lots of mostly roadside tracks with plenty of sticks attesting to the little use they get & some old railway routes saw us lunch at the border after 100k’s with various gourmet delights coming out. After lunch we headed down the sandy & whoopy border track with Jim going through the sand riding learning curve at a rate of knots on the new blue 450 with noisy pipe. We came across the legendry Klaus Mueller leading a tour group of 10 & amazingly after a brief chat he took off instead of waiting for both groups to get there to avoid any head ons. We were not impressed by this from someone who should know better. Luckily there were no direct hits, but plenty of near misses. Eventually we hit Pinnaroo for fuel with Mat getting in on lay over.

Team USA Wins and Ties Team Point Standings

AURORA, Ill. (May 15, 2006) – Team USA was victorious Saturday evening at the second of three stops on the Hardcore Freestyle Motocross tour at Hartwall Areena in Helsinki, Finland. The win tied the team standings for the series with one event left. Fans can follow television coverage of the Hardcore Freestyle Motocross exclusively on Eurosport, Europe’s leading sports media platform, in one-hour programs of the energy-packed events.

In the Team Europe vs. Team USA format, it was USA’s Beau Bamburg that out-performed Team Europe and guided the Americans to victory in front of the packed Hartwall Areena crowd. However, the event did not unfold without some amazing drama.

Mickael Pichon is back. The Frenchman raced to two wins in a round of the ADAC Masters, held at the Mehrnbach circuit in Austria. The KTM factory rider who had missed the Grand Prix of Germany last weekend beat home fellow KTM rider David Philipparts and Belgian rider Danny Theybers.

Overall
1 Mickael PICHON
2 David PHILIPPAERTS
3 Danny THEYBERS
4 Wyatt AVIS
5 Jerome HEMERY
6 Oswald REISINGER
7 Lauris FREIBERGS
8 Dennis SCHRÖTER
9 Marcus SCHIFFER
10 Collin DUGMORE

After a highly successful opening day at the third round of the World Enduro Championship -the GP of Euskadi staged in Gernika Spain, KTM Enduro Factory Team Farioli riders Ivan Cervantes and David Knight repeated their respective Enduro 1 and Enduro 3 class wins and were backed up by yet more strong results from their KTM team mates. Finishing as runner-up in the E1 class to Cervantes was KTM’s Alessandro Belometti while Marko Tarkkala finished second to Knight in the E3 class. As on day one Samuli Aro finished in third in the fiercely competitive Enduro 2 class.

With the dull weather of day one replaced by clear skies and warm temperatures day two of the GP of Euskadi proved to be extremely tiring for all riders, including the world’s best. With nine timed special tests and three laps of the cut-up, rough and rutted course to complete at the end of the event all KTM factory team riders were not only pleased to have finished but of the same opinion that the race was possibly a little too hard — especially for the lesser experienced and Enduro Junior class riders.

The KTM Enduro Factory Team Farioli squad had a highly successful opening day at the third round of the ’06 World Enduro Championship, the GP of Euskadi (Spain), where team riders Ivan Cervantes and Alessandro Belometti placed first and second in the Enduro 1 class while David Knight and Marko Tarkkala also placed on the top two steps of the podium in the Enduro 3 category. In the Enduro 2 class Samuli Aro claimed third

After rocky and dusty conditions at the GP of Portugal made things difficult at round two of the WEC series, heavy rain before the GP of Euskadi ensured that conditions were also extremely challenging in Gernika. But instead of fine dust and lose rocks making things difficult it was mud that challenged the world’s best enduro riders. Added to a demanding course were three tough special tests. With the enduro test the longest seen in a WEC event for many years, it was the extreme test that caught many riders out and played a large roll in deciding the end of day results.

PICKERINGTON, Ohio (May 11, 2006) -- AMA Pro Racing and the National Promoters Group (NPG) announced today that Next Level Sports Management will coordinate media relations efforts for the 2006 AMA Toyota Motocross Championship presented by FMF.

Next Level will be represented by Tony Gardea, who will manage efforts along with AMA Pro Racing and NPG to ensure a collaborative effort of promoting the series through various media platforms. A consistent stream of news, facts, stats and quotes will be readily available to the media covering the 12-race 2006 AMA Toyota Motocross Championship.

“We are pleased to bring Next Level and Tony into AMA Motocross,

EASTER CAMP 14/4/06-17/4/06 - PYRENEES

Arrived a bit before midnight to find a few still up & the rest in bed. No fire going but it was a mild night so there had been no need to look for wood in the dark. Welly was there after the big trip down from the Hill. Started Saturday with 9 riders & quickly commenced throwing ourselves up & down huge hills. Quite a few get offs with Welly excelling. Lunched atop Mt Cole as the weather closed in. Those silly enough to bring jackets even though the day started fine & warm put them on as the rain started & the rest of us got wet. Due to the inclement weather & Welly suffering from a longstanding flu with his asthma taking a turn for the worse in these conditions we high tailed it for camp to get there before the big rain started after a big 46k’s! Did a wet wood patrol & cranked up the fire in the very welcome shelter shed & settled in for the arvo & evening keeping warm & dry with plenty of bench racing & a little liquid refreshment.

CUDLEE CREEK 9/4/06

We had some early arrivals & some late with various excuses & eventually 20 riders got away only a bit late on a beautiful autumn day. The first 2 to get lost went wrong at the first turn due to the lead rider not realising that it was possible for people to not see 10 metres to where he went up the driveway instead of down the lane so he thought he didn’t need to leave a cornerman there. They soon came back & away we went for a loop on the property. Naturally a few crashes occurred as big hills & slippery conditions caught some out. Someone had to be extricated from the middle of a large blackberry patch. After almost too much fun we left the 5 staying on the property & headed for the hills. Great scenery as the hills & dales are starting to turn green with autumn leaves coming out saw us at the infamous Mt Torrens, where Tom took 3 goes to get up due to not many knobs after only 400 k’s on the MT32 due to riding like his dad bought the bike. A few crashes saw most who were brave enough to venture down eventually get back up with Ken ecstatic about the power of his new 06 EXC450. Off we blasted with the next incident being lead & tail riders being chatted by a friendly policeman. Tom’s number plate was partly obscured due to an incident with a big mud hole on the previous day’s recon ride but he only had a licence check & for some reason he wanted my tail light to be vertical instead of horizontal. No bookings though as he had real crime to chase & off we went, only to have someone forget to turn in the direction a cornerman’s bike was pointing & the ride slowly ground to a halt until he was found & we took off again. Shortly after that we nearly had to throw a bucket of cold water on 2 blue bikes which were laying on top of each other in the middle of the road on a tight bend. Lots more scenic back road blasting saw us at Tungkillo for lunch.

COOMANDOOK 2/4/06

24 starters was a good turn up for the first ride of the season, all champing at the bit. Mark G had the new 300cc 2 stroke Gasser out but Mark R left his Gasser home as he thought the terrain suited the XR650 better. A good mix of blue, yellow & orange bikes with a sprinkling of others with Ben coming all the way from Moonta leaving Katie to drive the tractor!

Off we went on time up the track. It wasn’t long before rusty riders started to hit things & fall down, with Mike P going over the bars in front of me ending up sprawled on the sandy rut with the bike pointing the wrong way. All bikes must have been well prepped over the off season as we had no mechanical dramas or flats for the day. At a regroup Matt did a speccy jump over the road with no-one else game (even Tom whooping it up on the 525 having recovered from his bout of glandular fever). At one stage leader Becky was tapped out in 5th on the 426 & Tom pulled alongside & proceeded to do a mono next to him for a long way – Peter was duly impressed – oh yeah, Tom posted a new max speed during the day of 152 – it must be properly run in & loosened up now.

The strong start KTM’s factory enduro team riders made on day one of the opening round of the ’06 WEC series got even better on day two where Ivan Cervantes topped the Enduro 1 class, Samuli Aro the Enduro 2 class and David Knight the Enduro 3 class. In doing so the three KTM riders now lead the E1, E2 and E3 world championship standings.

In the Enduro 1 class Ivan Cervantes went one better than he did on day one and topped the class by close to half a minute. Winning six of the day’s special tests the reigning E1 world champion showed just how good he is by mastering the difficult conditions – something most thought a former motocross rider from southern Europe would never do. Disappointingly day two was a frustrating one for his Italian team-mate Alessandro Belometti. Matching his day one finishing position of seventh, Belometti struggled to feel comfortably in the changing conditions and as a result saw several mistakes prevent him from finishing higher.