MATCH REPORT: BYJL Midlands Round 4 at East Park

In the sunshine at East Park the last of the four Midlands rounds produced another day of entertaining racing as the series trophies were decided.

This year the standard of the U8’s competition has been impressive and Birmingham’s Samuel Price was a young man determined to collect another winner’s trophy and he did just that with five wins on the day. Second place in the final for Yoanna Gilpin, the first year rider from Coventry, was enough to secure her first place overall on 90 points, which included two A final wins. Samuel was second on 88 points, with Kylan Bould on 68 points, just pipping Dominic Price on 65 points for third place.

In the U10’s it was Liam Wells who took his third consecutive A final win to take the overall title on 95 points. On the bigger tracks Liam, who is still riding a small bike, has had to work hard to keep ahead of the riders on bigger bikes and that was the case again yesterday when he showed excellent trackcraft in fending off all of Corey Burt’s challenges in the final. In the qualifying races those two plus Chester Gilpin all scored the same points but Liam has had the upper hand in the GP finals, with Chester taking second on 77 points, ahead of Corey on 74 points and Jude Wilcockson just behind on 68 points.

PHOTOS: BYJL Round 4 photos by 57studio

https://www.facebook.com/pg/eastparkwolves/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1631865433577839

There were further trophies for the Wells family in the U12s where older brother Kyle completed a clean sweep of the series to take the title on 100 points. In the final Charlie Buet-Gannonn looked on his way to a win until eventually being caught by Kyle, with Lewis Middleton beating team mate Lewis Fry for third. Charlie’s second place was enough for second place overall on 72 points, with Connor Steel taking third on 69 points. Having injured himself in training in the week, Connor turned up in hope that the points for last on the day would be enough to claim a podium spot and that was the case as he finished 5 points ahead of Lewis Middleton.

There were just four riders in the U14’s but they put on some competitive racing, particularly home rider Alexsander Maslanka and Wednesfield’s Ellis Webster. Ellis’s passing abilities helped him to victory on the day but the overall title went to Alexsander on 88 points, with Ellis two points behind and Jonathan Middleton taking third with 76 points.

The Girls event was not without incident and ended in the best race of the day with all four riders in the final in the mix right to the line. Leicester’s exciting rider Sophie Sinclair-Black got the victory her efforts this year deserved and behind her Bekah Humphries fought off the challenges of Chloe Whitehead who in turn was being pressurised by Honey Whitehead . The overall series victory though went to Georgia Burt on 82 points, with Sophie on 79 and Chloe on 77 points.

In the U18’s Damien Pelaczyk showed why he is the current World Junior Number 2 with an unbeaten performance, with Ewan Hancox having to settle for second place on the day, ahead of Cameron Gill and Tyler Bould. That fourth place was enough for Tyler, in his first year at this age level, to take the overall title on 77 points, ahead of Cameron on 74 points with Ewan third on 70 points, despite missing one round.

Victory on the day in the team competition saw Coventry draw level with Leicester on 18 points and they both qualify for the National rounds team competition. The other standings were Wednesfield 9 points, Birmingham 8 points and East Park on 7 points.

The most important thing is that everyone has enjoyed their day’s racing at these rounds and that we have welcomed a number of new riders to the competition, including little Jacob Jewkes, following in CJ & Nat’s tyre tracks. These days are important for the development of the younger riders and I would again like to thank the staging clubs and the parents for their support this year.

We now move onto the National rounds, where I am sure there will be plenty of Midlands riders, and look forward to the Midlands round at Coventry on August 11.