Video and words: Liam Joyce of @Kontikifilms
Photos: Adam Conrad of @Cult_media
Fort William, a track that is demanding on both bike and rider. A venue that come race weekend never fails to provide probably the best crowd on the World Cup circuit. For three of our four riders, this is their home race and the desire to claim a good result on home soil was high.
Arriving on Wednesday evening the pits were assembled and the team settled in to a small cottage in the nearby town.
This year we saw a completely new middle section of the track that posed a new challenge to all the riders. Sailing through practice the boys had their lines dialled in and were looking rapid ready for qualifying.
Come Saturday the new section of track was saturated, after some heavy rain spells the woods section turned into a concoction of chocolate moose, roots and horsefly sized mosquitoes.
With the weather taking a turn for the worse, the goal for most riders was get down this section and keep their run clean. Henry and George both qualified with crashes in this section, clearly showing that both the boys were to say the least, on pace.
Phil and David also breezed through practice in comfortable positions, Phil 20th and David 42nd.
Race day and the Sun was out. The fans piled in and the stage was set for a epic race. Unfortunately our junior riders, brothers George and Henry Kerr both fell in race runs and didn’t clinch the results the splits showed possible. Luck was also not with Mr David Trummer, who suffered a mechanical on the top section of the course, ending his run.
Phil put together a smashing run, but like many others squirmed his was through the custard pit of a wood section claiming a respectable 29th, though as he states not the result he was looking for. The team however have won the race to Leogang and were the first to show up at the Austrian race venue today. Looking forward to the next race !
