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Be careful what you wish for: Saturday's dust quickly turned to Sunday's mud. It was actually quite good as the rain held off for a good part of the day and the track, despite being a little slippery in places, there was actually a lot more traction then riders anticipated. A lot of the riders thought that it was the best day of all three.
The 9 am start time put the pressure on the organizers but it worked out well. The idea was a to have an early start, a slightly shorter track, and an early finish. Saturdays Experts Only extreme test was doubled in length and opened to the Intermediates as well.
The only casualty was a hill early on in the first section which most riders had problems with. The time for this section was zeroed.
Greg Power turned up to cheer on son Chris and show him where the good lines were. Chris (CRF250) did mention that it was occassionally a little disconcerting to come flying round a corner in a special test to find dad frantically gesturing for him to 'take the other line' but it all obviously worked as he powered his way to a 9 second win over Wellingtonian Rory Mead.
While Rory might not have been happy taking second he was definitely happy finishing what started out as the weekend from hell. Just south of Levin an oncoming van had a tyre disintegrate as the van veered across into their path. Dad Jamie frantically braked and swerved, almost pulling off the perfect evasive manovurve. And then their van briefly lost traction, hooked up again, and rolled, writing off the vehicle. They ended up on their sides shaken and stirred. And they still made Saturday's start.
As well as being 2nd on the day Rory won the Expert E1 class and the overall Expert title in the 3 round North Island Champs.
Mitchell Nield was a close 2nd in the Experts series results. A fourth place or better on the Sunday would have seen him take the title but a bad third terrain test bumped him down to 7th for the day.
One day enduros are relatively easy to organize, compared to the work that has to go into a two day. It was a pity that Tar Hill was not available for the two days because everyone likes riding there but Oparau actually worked out well. The riders that didn’t attend this two-day will never know what they missed out on as two day events are few and far between and this one was a cracker.
