(for background to Conducted Trials click here)
*Bob Owen Trial – Conducted Report*, 10th November 2024
I don’t know about anyone else, but it didn’t take me long to fall asleep last night.
What an absolutely phenomenal end to the year.
Full of nothing but highs.
A nice big entry and lots of new and returning faces.
To start with, a huge welcome to
Brandon Casey 👋
Harrison Cockshott 👋
Freddie Moore 👋
6 fantastic sections were marked out within the Parkwood Off Road Centre superb grounds.
Section 1,2,3 were within the rock garden of the centre, and it’s certainly a rock garden that is intimidating, it’s seen world champions ride around it and now future champions. These were also set out in between 2 sections of the Adult course, so a perfect opportunity for the Adults to see what’s quickly coming upon them as competition.
Section 4 was a good old down a muddy banking, hard right and back up to come back down, we know kids love rollercoasters, so we took the opportunity of making one.
Section 5 was a test of traditional trials riding, slow round the trees getting the arms and legs bent.
Section 6, this was an early Scott training section, a rocky stream bed with a step at the end, flags on the banking and it was a good point and shoot and see where the rocks guided you.
So how did we all do then? Firstly, every single rider was riding like a champ, there was some seriously good riding skills on show.
On the Red Route:
Jamie Waddington is certainly showing some good skill upon his Beta Evo 80, taking 3rd place on the day
Tate Croft has come back to trials after a break for Enduro, showing that Enduro grit and determination taking 2nd place on the day with 53 marks dropped.
Rocco Watson is always a joy to watch, and indeed has taken 1st on the day and provisionally 1st in Class for the year.
Welldone all red route riders, it was certainly set out to test and educate, and it did just that.
Yellow Route:
Again, all Yellow route riders were indeed outstanding to watch, backed up by some adult riders taking time out to come and watch who had nothing but admiration for all our juniors.
Third place, on the day was Alfie Dykes making sure there is indeed petrol on the podium.
This did make third place in the championship very close, with Tom provisionally taking 3rd in the championship.
Second place Maisie Danes, who missed out on first place with her nemesis section 6 taking the majority of her points. Second on the day and provisionally Second in the season.
Top spot, Benjamin Swainson who had a fight on his hands, Maisie was pushing hard all day and all season, great battle between the two and makes for good telly. (If Trials was on TV)
First on the day and Provisionally First in the championship.
White Route:
Emma Mitchell rode a blinder of a trial, going clean all day secured her First on the day and Provisional First in the Championship.
Oliver Clark was hot on her heels, (Clerk of the Course, don’t worry she didn’t really have heels on, appropriate trials boots were worn)
Finishing the day on only 4 marks dropped and taking provisional Second place for the year.
As always a huge thankyou to Chris Mitchell Faye Mitchell Joanne Dykes Joe Dykes and Chris Bancroft for the continued support, without you, the Trials UK Ltd conducted series would not be the success it is.
Thank you to all Parents for giving your young ones this amazing opportunity in life and indeed for supporting Horsforth & District Motor Club and more so our Bob Owen Charity Trial.
The winner of our KUDU giveaway bag, was Ned Fawcett, Thankyou Russ Brodie for providing this extra bit of fun and Lucy for expertly pulling a number out of the bag.
In the words of Porky Pig…. ‘That’s all Folks’
Chris Bancroft
For a bit of background info on the junior Conducted Trials click here
Well summer holidays are over, and our Juniors are off back to school. We have some starting year 6, some starting high school and maybe some starting a new school or new class.
Good luck to you all and enjoy it.
See you all in October for Dry Gill.
Harry Hemingway may have won the Trial GB at the famous Addingham Moorside, but I’m afraid once again the real trial action for the weekend was taking place at the even more famous Bumpy trials park and excitement provided by our ever growing Youth riders.
Thankfully the rain held off for the duration of the trial, which allowed the section markers to test the skills of our 12 Small Wheel riders on varied terrain.
Ranging from a Mini Luskys Leadmine Marathon up the stream, dusty off camber decents and climbs and the thing all riders young and old dread! Tree roots!
We went one more, Tree roots off camber up and down hill!
Usual routes Red ‘Hard’ / Yellow ‘Medium’ / White ‘Easy’
Red Route: Maisie Danes stepped up from her usual Yellow route for this trial. Maisie’s Team Manager / Minder / Tea boy felt this was a good move to test Maisie ahead of her British Youth trials. And my word did she attack the Red route with her great skill and commitment. Dropping only 19 marks for the day was a fantastic result.
Maisie started the day as the only Red route rider, but at sign on we were informed by little Arthur Woods dad he too would like to have a go at Red. I’ll be honest, myself and Jamie had reservations on this and I did ensure that Arthur was ok with what was ahead of him. Bigger steps, tighter turns. Arthur stood his ground and said he wanted to do it. We could only accept the determination and hope the colour came back to his dad’s face soon, drip white wasn’t his colour.
Arthur gave every section his all, and showed he did have that grit and determination, his skill also shone through, yet unfortunately marks were dropped more due to the limitations of the small wheel size of his TRS. To finish on 66 marks dropped only 47 behind Maisie certainly got the thumbs up from us.
Well done Arthur and I hope your dad’s recovered from a day of panic and worry 
.
Yellow: In a trial, you can often have a good idea of positions before results come out. Not at yesterday’s trial. Theo Jepson and Tom Mitchell were battling it out in their group, and spent the day dropping a mark, then the other would clean, next section they would swap, and in the other groups Joshua Bancroft and Alfie Dykes also made the score difficult to guess. Joshua sadly got offline and had his front wheel catch throwing him off balance to dap but not strong enough to hold up the Evo 80 so 5’d, whilst later on Alfie also offline just before the dreaded tree routes threw him off sideways to also take a well earned lay down in the dirt.
To see the results combined for the day and seeing 2nd-5th place only have 4 marks difference shows how tight the fight was.
Benjamin Swainson showed his ever improving style and being a Bumpy trained rider brought home 1st place on home soil with only 1 mark dropped.
2nd Alfie Dykes 13 marks dropped Theo and Tom post trial paddock talk, thought maybe tied and would go to most cleans, actually had Theo pip Tom to 3rd place by 1 mark. Theo 3rd on 14 marks and Tom 4th on 15 dropped.
White: White route also had a close fight ‘can you see why the British round had nothing on us now!’
Emma Mitchell and Oliver Clark spent the day neck and neck, Section 1, both dropping 1 mark on lap 1 then clean through out. Section 2, Cleans up to lap 4 where Oliver dropped 1 mark, Section 3, Emma pulled ahead with clean where Oliver dropped 2! It went on like this all day!
Final results saw Emma on top spot with 4 Marks dropped, Oliver got on her heels ‘don’t worry ACU, she wasn’t riding in heels!’ With 9 marks dropped.
Team Fawcett travelled cross borders to attend our trial, and it’s always nice to see riders come from afar to support and join in the fun.
Ned was 3rd place on white with 39 marks and Wilfred on Yellow route dropped 30 for 6th place. Another set of riders who are growing in confidence and skill, and always have a smile on their face.
We should possibly do this officially, but I think those who watched would agree, rider of the day must go to Mia Green.
Mia is growing in confidence, and starting to trust standing up over varied terrain.
Riding the White route, as the day went on Mia got more and more confident where at section 5 rode 4 times, stood up and for 4 cleans. Followed by 2 cleans on Section 6.
I believe the news reported a sonic boom, but this was just us giving Mia a well deserved round of applause.
Mia, trust your bike, trust yourself, when stood up you looked amazing and in control. Most of all trust your dad, he knows what he’s doing.
It was a long report and I hope you had time in your busy days to read the full report, it’s long because it was a Fantastic trial.
Remember 2025 we will be adding a 50/50 option. And the severity of the red routes they will ride will be about the same as this trial.
This allows us to bridge the gap between those wanting to progress to Red but allow us to keep some higher severity to test our British Youth riders. If you need more understanding, please get in touch with Chris Bancroft.
As always these trials do not just happen, a lot of work goes on before and on the day of a trial.
Thank you to
Bumpy Ltd for the use of the land and the work the Charity does for our sport.
Trials UK Ltd for supporting the Conducted series
KUDU for Printing number boards / Section boards / observers boards. But also our club clothing, order online
https://kuduproducts.co.uk/hdmc.htm
Martin Fairburn for entries and results amongst many other tasks
To all the parents for supporting your little trials riders and giving them this fantastic opportunity.
Joe Dykes Chris Mitchell Chris Bancroft for Marking out a fantastic trial
And of course Joanne Dykes and Chris Mitchell for observing.
Faye for pictures of her group and Chris of the other group.
Chris Bancroft
