As published in whole or in part on the ACU (News) and UK Clubsport websites
WIRRAL HUNDRED’S SUNNY SEASON-OPENER AT ANGLESEY
The Wirral Hundred club is synonymous with early season race meetings at Anglesey and the meeting on 19 & 20th March saw dry, sunny but somewhat chilly conditions, only a handful of fallers, no serious stoppages, and some great racing. The only concern was the disappointing level of entries.
The AS Racing Club Supersport class (formerly Formula 600) saw the biggest grids and probably the best racing of the day, with the evergreen Adrian Kershaw taking narrow wins in the first three races from W100’s 2021 champion Barry Dimelow, but a red flag in the fourth race brought a premature end with the positions reversed. Young Irishman Eoin Collins was the best of the rest. For 2022, pre-2011 machines have been grouped into a sub-class to encourage riders of older machines, and Glenn Walker (3 class wins) and Josh Potts (1 win) took the honours this time. It was not surprising that Kershaw and Dimelow shared the honours with a win apiece in the Anglesey Vans Senior Open races, and it was good to see that Jay Dunn, a former national and European contender, returning to the sport for his first meeting in 9 years, take a 3rd place.
With trophy sponsor Carl Roberts absent through illness, it was fitting that James Chawke, a former Manx Grand Prix winner and one of his supported riders, should win three of the Carl Roberts / Emjess Racing Powerbikes races. Mike Bampton narrowly but impressively won the first race on his ZXR750 before some technical problems set in. Paul Sommerville took advantage of Bampton’s woes and took three 2nd places and his first W100 trophies.
Barry Furber, a former W100 Twins champion, returned to the fold aboard one of the new Yamaha R7’s and in all four races was a little too strong for Max Dixon, who finished 2nd in the championship in 2021. The 3rd positions were shared by Liam Chawke and Ryan Strafford. The Twins shared track-time with the riders in the Creation Campers Golden Era Supersport class, and once again the multi-times Club champion Tim Bradley dominated and won each of the four races comfortably; each time Matthew Jones (the one from Halifax) was second.
The 100-500cc Allcomes races had an interesting mix of riders and machines, with the experienced Andy Jackson (TZ Yamaha) taking four narrow wins from the teenager Ted Wilkinson (Honda NSF), who is about to embark on a season racing in the British Talent Cup. There was also a broad age-range behind these two with the 3rd places being shared by the not-so-young Adrian Morris and two other teenagers - Alfie Davidson (also heading towards BTC) and Oliver Morgan-Edwards. Andy Jackson and Max Dixon (Twins) shared the wins in the two Anglesey Vans Junior Open races.
Sadly on this occasion there was a particularly depleted grid for the combined Pre-Injection and Steve Dale M/Cycles Forgotten Era races. Mike Bampton carried on from last year in the PIJ class dominating the first three races from James Leatham both on ZXR750’s, but Bampton missed the fourth race and Leatham took his first win. Dan Hanby won three of the F/E races, with Tim Kermode winning the other.
There was no doubting the quality of the Chris Forster Open Sidecar races; the crews were having their first outings of the year with many getting in some valuable track time ahead of their British championship series and the TT. George Holden & Oscar Lawrence took the win in race 1 but were then side-lined by an engine failure; Rob Biggs & Jeroen Schmitz won the next two races, whilst Steve & Matty Ramsden won the final race. Club regulars Craig Hauxwell & Derek Taylor and Steve Markland & Owen Rigby filled the minor placings.
W100’s next race meeting will be at Oulton Park on Saturday 23rd April, when it will be catering for all of its usual classes, as well as hosting rounds of the GP Originals and FSRA Pre-Injection Sidecar championships. This meeting will also feature the David Swallow Memorial Race for classic machines.
Other Wirral witterings
New riders’ course – it was pleasing that we were able to organise courses for new riders for the first time for two years. A Zoom-based theoretical course took place on the Thursday, two days before the riders embarked on their riding assessments. We are delighted to say that they all passed, and we hope to see them riding with us in the coming months. Thanks then to the team of Dave Francis, Paul Brandon, Martin Crook, Neil Broughton and Gary Bumford, together with a little help from Tim Bradley, that enabled it all to happen.
Fastest lap of the weekend - Barry Dimelow: 1 min 09.800 secs, 79.94 mph
Casualties – there were just three reportable visits to the medical centre. David Powley’s broken foot after his high-side exiting Church on Saturday was the worst injury, but it was good to see him back in the paddock on Sunday, albeit on crutches. We wish him a speedy recovery.
New challenges – Helen Smith can obviously be proud of her debut as our Road Race Secretary (she even seemed to enjoy it), and illness and other commitments meant that others had to step forward to new roles. James Labdon took over the red-flag duties on the start-line, Rhian Wynne lap-scored on the pit-wall and Lyn Francis became the ACU Steward, Not a hitch!
Rider numbers – there was no problem with the weather forecast or the weather, we had a full complement of highly efficient marshals and medics, there were no serious injuries, there was a decent crowd, the commentator was back to his noisy, excitable best, and virtually all the races ran their full distance of 10 or 12 laps. But – oh,dear! – where were the riders, why were the grids so sparse?
Surely we did not deserve such a low turn-out and such a resultant financial loss, a situation that is obviously unsustainable looking forward. Riders – please give us your support and spread the word, starting with Oulton Park next month!
