MATCH REPORT: British Club Championships Day 1

July 3, 2021 Steve Copping

The Opening day of the 2021 British Club Championships at Great Blakenham saw the Under 12, Under 14, Junior & Open categories decided. The action began with 7 teams contesting the Under 14’s event featuring 2 teams from Coventry as well as teams from Kesgrave, Ipswich, Norwich, Hellingly & Hethersett. It was Kesgrave who emerged as the winners as Charlie Parr & Ryker Jolly went through the match undefeated, scoring 7-3’s in each of their races. The Norwich pairing of Will Blackmore & Shaun Kell took the runner-s up spot with 34 points ahead of the Ipswich pairing of Mitchell & Detlan Baker who finished with 30 points. Detlan defeated Coventry A’s Charlie Smith in a run-off for 3rd after Charlie & his partner Jude Wilcockson also scored 30 points

The top 3 teams in the Under 14 Club Championship. Photo taken by Steve Copping

Kesgrave 42: Charlie Parr 21, Ryker Jolly 21, Luca Woodhouse dnr, Lily Parr dnr
Norwich 34: Shaun Kell 21, Will Blackmore 13
Ipswich 30: Detlan Baker 17, Mitchell Baker 13
Coventry A 30: Charlie Smith 16, Jude Wilcockson 14
Hethersett 26: Mason Martin 19, Aiesha Musa 4, Will Clarke 3
Coventry B 26: Chester Gilpin 15, Autumn Smith 7, Yoanna Gilpin 4
Hellingly 22: Harry Sefton 13, Harry Ridley 4, Paul Edwards 3, Dylan Geer 2

Referee: Kevin Wells (Norfolk)

The Junior Club Championship returned to the schedule after a 3 year absence and Ipswich made a successful defence of the title they won in 2018 at Kesgrave, scoring 27 points out of a possible 28. Ben Clarke & Lewis Brinkhoff were both undefeated by an opponent whilst Kai Gowers weighed in with 10 points. Kesgrave were runners-up with 20 points whilst Hethersett took 3rd with 13 points.

Ipswich 27: Ben Clarke 10, Kai Gowers 10, Lewis Brinkhoff 7

Kesgrave 20: Torsten Jolly 7, Noah Woodhouse 7, Charlie Beeton 4, Phoebe Hammond 2

Hethersett 13: McKenzie Loombe 7, Paul Delaiche 6

Referee: Shaun Dyball (Norfolk)

The Open Club Championship semi-finals followed and the first match saw Birmingham, Coventry & Ipswich face each other. Wednesfield should have been the 4th team in this match but withdrew from the event due to rider unavailability. It was Birmingham & Ipswich who advanced to the final, having both scored 51 points. British Champion Paul Heard was undefeated by an opponent for Birmingham whilst Lewis Brinkhoff was Ipswich’s top scorer with 14 points. Coventry missed out with 40 points, Cameron Gill & Myke Grimes scoring 11 each

Birmingham 51: Paul Heard 16, Chris Timms 11, Nathan Groves 10, Ricki Johnson 7, Mark Winwood 7

Ipswich 51: Lewis Brinkhoff 14, Tyler Brinkhoff 13, Ben Clarke 12, Ashley Hill 9, James Porter 3

Coventry 40: Cameron Gill 11, Myke Grimes 11, Dan Drewitt 8, Dan Smith 6, Marc Gilpin 4

Referee: Steve Copping (Suffolk)

The 2nd Open Semi-Final was also a 3 team match with Poole having withdrawn earlier in the week. The host club Great Blakenham, Horspath and Sheffield would be the teams competing to join Birmingham & Ipswich in the final and it was Horspath who top scored with 59 points, World Champion Ben Mould racing to a maximum. Great Blakenham would be the other team to qualify for the final with 47 points with British Indoor Champion Adam Peck their top scorer with 13. Sheffield would be the team to miss out on the final with 38 points, Ed Morton their top scorer with 12 points

Horspath 59: Ben Mould 16, Zac Payne 11, Wil Jeffery 11, Mark Boaler 11, Mark Carmichael 10

Great Blakenham 47: Adam Peck 13, Jamie Chittock 12, Jason Ashford 12, Leon Mower 8, Bill Rhodes 2

Sheffield 38: Ed Morton 12, Kyle Holland 9, Niall Morton 9, Kielan Burton 8, Luke Morton dnr

Referee: Kevin Wells (Norfolk)

The next Club Championship to be decided was the Under 12’s and this took place in heavy rain but the riders stuck to their task in awful conditions. The competition featured 2 teams from Kesgrave as well as Norwich, Hethersett and Great Blakenham. It was a Kesgrave 1-2 as their A team won the title scoring 27 points out of a possible 28, Harvey Shumake the only rider to drop a point as all the other riders raced unbeaten. Kesgrave’s B team were runners-up on 24 points with Norwich finishing 3rd with 19 points

The Under 12’s top 3. Photo taken by Paul Jarrett

Kesgrave A 27: Harvey Shumake 8, Lily Parr 8, Luca Woodhouse 8, Oscar Hammond 3

Kesgrave B 24: Amberley Gant 8, Ollie Edmunds 7, Lynton Titshall 6, Charlie Spurgeon 3

Norwich 19: Connor Jarrett 12, Zackery Eastwood 7

Hethersett 15: Aiesha Musa 7, Will Clarke 5, Thalia Silver 3

Great Blakenham 13: Logan Faber 11, Haydn Mitchell 2

Referee: Steve Copping (Suffolk)

The rain cleared up for the Open Club Championship Final between Horspath, Ipswich, Great Blakenham & Birmingham and after 10 races the host club held a 2 point lead from Horspath on 26, Birmingham on 25 and Ipswich on 21. Great Blakenham then had 4 successive last places whilst Horapath moved into the lead with 12 points during those 4 races. Going into the last 2 races there were 6 points separating all 4 teams with Horspath on 38, Ipswich & Birmingham on 35 and Great Blakenham on 32. Any outside chance that the hosts had of winning disappeared in the penultimate heat when Adam Peck suffered a gate exclusion. Mark Carmichael took the win to put Horspath 4 points up on Ipswich with Birmingham a further point back. This meant that Ipswich needed to win the last race and hope that Horspath failed to score to force a run-off for the champipnship. The race needed 3 attempts to complete. The first attempt wa stopped after Josh Brooke fell and was excluded as being the cause of the stoppage, then in the re-run Ben Mould was excluded for taking an opponent to the extremities of the track which left Chris Timms to defeat Lewis Brinkhoff which confirmed Horspath as champions and Birmingham as runners-up, Ricki Johnson defeating Ben Clarke after a run-off for 2nd and 3rd