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Photo - Stefan Merriman who won his class and took the outright victory at the 79th ISDE, Poland.
After the champagne corks have been popped and everybody is back in familiar territory, Lexy summarises the stunning victory in Poland that has been fraught with elements of difficulty and drama. Check out the WEBSITE: of Stefan Merriman, the Kiwi born Enduro ace (across the ditch they claim him as an Aussie) for photos (including the ISDE) his profile, events calendar, etc.
By Lexy Thorogood
We are finally back in Italy after a eventful two weeks in Poland at this years International Six Days of Enduro. The final result – Stefan won all that he could win, we didn’t get robbed, we both made it back to our base healthy and in one piece and nothing is broken!
I know it sounds like a strange thing to say, but this race was certainly testing in every sense of the word. After spending a month in Australia training (Stefan) and visiting family and friends (me) we flew back to Italy, which took almost 30 hours this time due to British Airway strikes in Heathrow, London. We got organised and four days later we were driving to Poland to prepare for the ISDE.
The drive took roughly 20 hours after crossing the Italian, Austrian, Czech and Polish border with roadworks and traffic jams to contend with. The roads in Poland were horrendous, with deep wheel ruts imprinted in the bitumen making it difficult to steer straight. We basically had to stay on 50 km an hour from the border to the race place.
No one in Poland speaks English, but we are fortunate enough to have a Polish teammate (Bart Oblucki) in the Team UFO Yamaha team to help us get settled in a secure hotel. The race was held in Kielce, 2 hours north of Krakow in a poor region well known for it’s crime. We decided to stay at the accommodation that Bart organised for us as it was safe and had a 24 hour guard. Besides which, the Polish club teams were staying there (do you think they would steal from the Polish? Not likely. Good choice).
The Australian team had most of the time checks covered with personnel but there was no one to assist at the tests. Our Team (UFO Yamaha) mostly work for the Italian team as they get their expenses paid by the Italian federation, and so it was mostly me and Stef’s mechanic (Guiliano) helping him at the tests. For all of you that don’t know, I am 7 months pregnant and trying to haul my fat belly around to all the tests is not as easy as it usually is. I decided the roads were too dangerous to go via scooter and so I arranged a lift around to the tests with a British girl at the event.
Stefan had a brilliant day on Day 1 winning the Enduro 2 class on the Yamaha 450. He was 40 seconds faster than his nearest rival Juha Salminen and 32 seconds faster overall than any other of the 460 riders competing!!! The race was not to be easy though the trail was dry, rough and bumpy between the tests and the tests themselves were very sandy and bumpy, only to deteriorate the more the event progressed. Before Stefan would arrive at each test I would walk around and check the conditions of the berms and note what lines the fastest guys in the Enduro 1 class were doing on each corner. I would then tell Stef this information before he would start the test to help him decide his lines and alert him to sections of tests where people were having difficulties.
Day 2 Stefan rode just as convincingly, with another stunning victory, the only difference was that Stefan’s main rival, Salminen’s bike broke down with suspected valve problems as he couldn’t get it started after the third test. He somehow managed to salvage the bike and continue 55 minutes later. Although he could continue the following day to assist his country in the World Trophy Teams. The 55 min penalty effectively excluded him from a place on the Enduro 2 podium as each day’s total time gives the cumulative result at the end of the Six Days. The British teams had bikes stolen and the ‘Polish mafia’ seem to have a nice little operation organised at the tests to steal the bikes of the mechanics assisting at the tests.
Day 3 was horrible. Whilst Stefan rode well, different tests and a renewed enthusiasm for the race saw Salminen set some blistering times in the tests. Stefan worked hard adjusting his bike setup as the conditions got rougher and more difficult, however Salminen prevailed and won the day by 11 seconds. Merriman however was not deterred and made some adjustments for the following day at his working period at the end of Day 3. My day was horrible. I arrived at the third test not knowing where Guiliano had got to, which was very unusual as he is always at each test. I arrived at the fourth test to hear from some Polish people that there had been a traffic incident and a mechanic on a bike had been killed. My heart immediately sunk as I wondered where Guiliano had got to. He turned up at the fourth test 10 mins late. Apparently he had got lost after the second test and took a different route to return to the paddock. He drove along the road and arrived at the scene of accident 20 secs after it happened.
Apparently a Dutch mechanic on a bike was travelling fast in one direction over the crest of a bridge and a oncoming car decided to do a u turn or cross the road after the peak of the bridge. The rider went through the front passenger side and killed both himself the front passenger and the driver. Absolutely tragic.(Ed. I have seen photos of the wreckage but reckoned they didn't have a place on Silver-Bullet. The bike hit the driver's door and I never imagined a motorcyle could cause so much damage to a car !) I could barely concentrate on the results of the race and neither could Guili who wanted to return to the paddock and quit for the day he was so upset. But we knew we had to hold it together, and keep the news from Stefan so as not to distract him.
We then arrived at the fifth test and heard news of another accident. A German rider had run into a tree on the trail shortly before the test and killed himself. The riders who arrived shortly after tried to revive him but he was bleeding heavily and there was no response to their efforts. He had broken his neck on impact. So sad. He was such a quiet guy, but loved enduro and had competed in World and European rounds for years. He will be sadly missed by the Enduro community. Stefan was furious at the end of the day with Giuli and I wondering what had got into us, we told him the news after he pushed his bike into the Parc Ferme. He was devastated.
Day 4 and 5, Merriman was back with a vengeance and battling with Salminen for precious seconds in each test. Constant adjustments to the bike in the conditions gave him the edge and he rode aggressively in all tests to win both days by 3 and 5 seconds respectively. He said the hardest part of the day was riding past the section of the trail where the German rider had crashed. He believes the dust may have had something to do with the incident, however the rider must have taken his eyes off the trail for a minute to hit the tree at this part in the trail. A Swedish rider was assaulted in the forest by some Polish spectators. There are two stories - one they were trying to steal his bike, the second and most likely was that they wanted him to pass through a mud hole and when he went around they beat him with wooden pickets and broke his forearm! As this is a very poor area many people on the track were drunk and you see young kids walking around drinking beer in the mornings. I would hate to imagine how many drunken drivers there are on the road, or if in fact the car in the incident had a drunken driver. I passed a guy on the road who walked out of a bar and stumbled to his car drunk only to get in and drive away!! Whilst Poland has come a long way since it’s communist days there are still undertones beneath the surface, which make you realised they haven’t progressed as much as they would have you believe.
At the end of the event Merriman had a stunning victory, clearly the fastest rider over this years ISDE winning with overall classification by a massive 57 seconds from KTM 500 rider, Samuli Aro. In the Enduro 2 class, Merriman was faster than Salminen on 4 out of 5 days of racing. The final motocross was cancelled due to dust and dangerous conditions and so the results stood as final at the end of Day 5.
For more information on the race and photos see Stefan's website.
