Great Jon of Gonerby! 2022 Lincolnshire Enduro Club Championship Round 4 – Race Report & Results

For the first time in the club’s relatively short history, Lincolnshire Enduro Club headed to a venue never raced on, for the fourth round of
the LEC/Back Office Pro 2022 series.

Report by Martin Southwick – Images courtesy of Graeme Taylor

Taking place at Great Gonerby near Grantham, the circuit provided a lap of mixed going with some off-camber hill climbs and fast field sections in the Lincolnshire sunshine.

Quite a few last-minute alterations were made to the course during track set-up due to some “sticky patches” found en route. In the end, the
club provided a lap of 3.6 miles for the 120 racers. Conditions were warm and windy (weather kind !). Short sharp rain showers during that
track set-up couldn’t dampen down possibly the worst thing on race day though . . the dust !!

Looking back at club records, there was another first for the club on Sunday too. It is the first time that a LEC race winner has not come from the Experts class. The Clubman or Sportsman classes couldn’t provide a victor either. It did however come from perhaps an unlikely source, a super quick lad in the over 40’s group. Hailing from the deep south (Kings Lynn !), Jon Pearson romped to a maiden victory with the club.

Taking into account the fact that Jon’s class started some two minutes behind the Experts, a win is even more impressive. Given that he would have had to battle through some of the other fast LEC riders to get to the front, the Husky FE250 “Enduro21” rider won by over a minute after 180 minutes of racing.

Jon’s first lap was slower than his nearest challengers as he scythed through traffic but as soon as he got his nose in front, he chipped away and was faster by those few vital seconds each lap over his rivals. Actually, some of the other Over 40’s must have been dining on raw steak the night before.

That class provided the fourth place rider overall on the day too, in the shape of Paul Hanks. Both riders were on twenty-two laps when the chequered flag descended, but it was a large margin of victory …some six minutes. Third in the Over 40’s was James Andrew, one lap down.

In the Experts group, Rob Johnson claimed the top spot. It was quite marginal though as there was under a minute between himself and runner-up Toby Hales. Elliot Milburn came along in third place., a further three minutes adrift. Only two riders in the Clubman class garnered twenty-two laps after the three hours. Tristan Palmer came home in the runner-up spot but by a little over one minute; beaten by Luke Taylor. Matthew Woolridge made up the podium, a lap adrift.

In the four-stroke Sportsman class, only two lads had twenty laps under their belt at race end. Bradley Tapper was chasing hard at the end but had to succumb to the faster Alex Shaw. Once more, the winning margin was near a minute. A lap down in third place was Ben Lonsdale.

The best scrap of the day came along in the Two-stroke Sportsman class. The top two lads, Christian Humphrey and Scott Stone could not be separated. Both finished on the same amount of laps at exactly the same time. …to the second. They were though, split by a few hundredths of a second. Whilst Christian was declared the winner, Scott can take some solace in the fact he won the “mystery lap” prize for the day. Sponsored by (https://properlyprotected.co.uk/), Scott came away with a brand new helmet.

In the Over 50’s class, Andy Jackson was the only rider to obtain twenty-one laps on his way to his first win of the year. A lap down was second-placed lad Ian Shepherd and then Mark Peckitt. The Trail/Classic group was won once again by Shaun Avison, with Peter Hoare placing second. Another repeat winner was Kevin Bartle Sr in the over 60’s. Keith Rowland pushed Kevin all the way to get the runner-up spot.

Well done to the half a dozen Beginners who took part at Gonerby. The club hopes to see you at the next “event”. This is a practice day at
Ropsley, once again near Grantham. . . . on 3rd July. Details of that and all other club info is here for members https://www.facebook.com/groups/LincolnshireEnduroClub . . . And here for non-members https://lincolnshireenduro.wixsite.com/lec2016

Results

Championship standings