As usual the weather and pre Xmas period seems to impact the numbers to Friday night racing. The outcome of riders away on holidays and perhaps some heading to the beach following a very warm Friday meant only 8 riders to race. This followed a good Wednesday night of training where some senior riders were back in attendance and the Coach had the motor bike in action for the first time this season.
The first race was a warm up 5 lap scratch race and Fletcher Hill maintained his dominance finishing ahead of Ryder Evans and Zac Evans. In the following 4 lap warm up Kate Geary looked like taking the win before Hugh Livingstone wound up the gear and sailed home a clear winner ahead of Kate and Renee Hardacre.
In the 1 lap dash against the clock, Fletcher recorded a new PB but perhaps it was a start just ahead of the whistle that gained him the time of 35.11 sec. Next home was Ryder Evan in 40.55sec who was perhaps a little slow away at the start. Hugh Livingstone showed great improvement to take nearly 2 secs of his time to set a new PB at 41.13 sec. Renee Hardacre was next at 44.21sec, closely followed by Kate Geary 44.76 sec and Zac Evans at 45.18sec. Bastian Jefferies and Stephen Spencer both did new PB’s at 49.38sec and 50.52 sec respectively.
It was then into the handicaps. In the A grade group, Fletcher Hill (scr) messed the handicapper up no end winning the first ahead of Ryder Evans (35) and Hugh Livingstone (60). After the handicapper increased the handicaps for the second race Fletcher stormed around to actually win with an increased margin ahead of Ryder(40) and Hugh (65).
In the B grade handicap, Kate Geary (scr) showed it was a night for the back markers as she won from Renee(10) and Bastian (25). In the re-handicap it was Renee (20) who took the honours in a close finish from Kate(scr) and Bastian (45) just getting over Stephen Spencer(75) to claim third place again.
The riders were then given some sprint heats. Fletcher took the first from Ryder whilst in the second closely fought heat, the referee had to step in for a win to Hugh over Zac. In the girls heat it was Renee grabbing the win over Kate after Kate tried to stall until the 200m mark and make it a drag race to the line. In the last heat it was Bastian winning from Stephen.
For something new the riders were given a 1 lap pursuit in 2 rider heats – 1 rider on each side of the track. In the first heat it was Fletcher over Ryder with a time of 36.69 sec. In the second, Hugh Livingstone took the honours in 40.57 sec ahead of Zac. Kate Geary proved too strong for Renee in a time of 43.08sec whilst Bastian had the win over Stephen in a time of 51.50sec. It is interesting to note that Hugh and Kate both did a quicker time than in their solo efforts against the clock earlier in the night.
To finish the night the riders raced an elimination and this week the major interest was on who would make it through to the final three and Hugh just managed to edge ahead of Zac to take third whilst although Ryder stuck to Fletchers wheel like glue he could not come around leaving Fletcher the win ahead of Ryder.
Lindsay
updated 8am 2nd June
