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Rockets stay top in regional rankings

EA Summer Series Round 7│East Anglia Series
Event: 10th July 2011
Event Details
Report: Phil Townsend

The Royston Rockets BMX Racing Club continue to lead the regional club rankings after they hosted round 7 of the 2011 Regional Series at their home track in Burns Road, Royston.

The BMX calendar is very busy at this time of the year and two of Royston's members were competing in the European Championships in Haarksbergen, Netherlands with Daniel Blanche unable to progress beyond the motos but Ethan Vernon taking second place in the 11 year male class, earning him the right to compete on the "E2" number plate next year.

With the clash of dates, and the world championships in Denmark coming up in a few weeks the Royston event was always going to be low on rider numbers but on the day over 100 riders made the journey to take part in the racing which was blessed with blue skies and sunshine - although the threatened rain later in the day persuaded the officials to speed the event up but even then the umbrellas were out for the finals.

Royston had 29 riders taking part in the event and the action started with the clubs novice riders, many of whom were taking part in their first major competition. No less than five Rockets were entered for the under 7 class with Joshua Izzard taking the win just ahead of Alex Burgess in second and Louie Silvain taking fourth chased home by Harriet Alexander who was representing the girls.

Youngest rider of the day, and only just old enough to compete, was four year old Jed Warrick who finished in eighth. In the 8-10 Novice category the win went to Bradley Marvell, a feat repeated by James Kirby in the 11-13 yr class. Moving into the expert classes Joshua Abbott took second place in the 6 & under final as did Elliott Bowyer in the 7 year class.

The 8 year class saw Callum Barrow and Daniel Biggs take seventh and eight places respectively whilst in the 9 year class, Louis Foreman took sixth overall and in 10 year class, James King took first in the A final, one place ahead of Ted Dalleywater in second.

The Girls 9-10 year class saw Faye Godfrey take fifth place and in the 11 year class the win went to Miles Fisher with Matthew Fraser chasing hard to finish in third. The 12 year class again saw Aaron Dalleywater taking the win in the A final and in the 15 year class James Handleigh took another win to boost the club points tally.

Unluckiest rider at the event was Jordan Godfrey in the 16's who after two fine wins in the early qualifying rounds took a heavy fall along with most other riders in the race and broke his shoulder - although his efforts in the early races impressed the judges enough to recognise him with one of the Riders of the Day awards.

The 17-24 year category saw Andrew Brooker take fifth and Shane Mills moved up into the class and finished in eighth after aggravating an earlier injury to his hand. In the Masters category (30+) Richard Townsend took another win with team mate Alex Shore-Nye taking fifth and in the Veteran Class (40+) the win went to Lee Alexander followed home by Darren foreman in second.

The final classes of the day were the riders on the 24" wheeled "Cruisers" and the ladies 17-29 class saw Royston's Helen Nicholl take first place and in the men's classes Matt Salmon took second in the 35-39yr category with new member Matthew Ellis in fifth.

The next regional event on the race calendar is on August 7th at Norwich for round 8 of the 10 round series and before that the Royston club will be taking part in the national series at Redditch over the weekend of 15th-17th July and the following week at the UCI World Championships in Copenhagen.

Royston's own club's nights continue with the gates opening at 6.00pm. See more about the club and BMX racing in the region at www.roystonrockets.co.uk and the BMX East Regional site on www.bmxeast.com or ring 01763 260959 for more information on BMX racing.