29th July 2012 – Hawkstone Park, Shropshire – 2012 Maxxis British Motocross Championship

For the sixth round of the 2012 Maxxis British Motocross Championship the HM Plant KTMUKteam head to the infamousHawkstoneParkin Shropshire for a mid-summer blast around one of theUK’s toughest race tracks. Although a little drier than anticipated the circuit still proves to be tortuously testing for both bikes and riders.

The difficult conditions seem to suit Kevin Strijbos who takes another overall win with maximum points – his fourth of the year so far. After easily winning the opening two motos a not so good start in race three means Kevin’s forced to battle through the pack to overcome fast starting wildcard Max Anstie and his closest championship challenger Shaun Simpson. But with superior speed, fitness and line selection Strijbos easily gets the job done and with just two rounds of the championship left to run he now holds a massive 49 point lead over Simpson.

After being sidelined for the last five weeks with an injured wrist it’s pleasing to see that Elliott Banks-Browne has lost none of his pace despite not racing since Desertmartin. However, luck isn’t with EBB at all at Hawkstone and despite setting the pace in all three motos a technical issue, a small crash and a ‘jerked’ wrist conspire to keep him off the podium and also means he loses the red plate to Mel Pocock. Running DNF-3-8 through the day Elliott now sits 16 points behind the new series leader with just six motos left to run.

MX2 team-mate James Dunn more than doubles his Maxxis points haul with an awesome day in theShropshiresand. A 14th in race one is backed up by a fighting fifth in the second moto that sees James cross the line right on the tail of the third and fourth placed finishers. Although he puts in another strong ride in the mixed-capacity third moto a spill in the closing stages means he unfortunately fails to net any more points. His haul from motos one and two still place him 10th overall though – a personal best in the British championship so far.

The team travels to Loket in theCzechRepublicfor the 12th round of the FIM Motocross World Championship next weekend before taking a week off to prepare for the British Grand Prix atMatterleyBasinon August 19/20.

Kevin Strijbos MX1 #22

“The day went good again. In the first race I took the holeshot and won pretty easy. In the second race I took the holeshot again but Max was second and he pushed me really hard in the beginning. I was looking for some better lines but I couldn’t find any and in the end I think he was a little bit tired or got arm pump or something. Anyway, I won again so that was good. In the third race I got a bad start off the concrete and I needed to dig deep to catch Shaun and Max because they’d made a big gap already by the second lap. It was difficult to reel them in but I was able to do it. Overall I’m happy and I made some good points on Shaun. Today has been good for the championship and I just have to keep it up at the next two rounds.”

Elliott Banks-Browne MX2 #44

“I holeshot race one and I was having a pretty good race with Mel – we were going back and forth and the lead must have changed six or seven times. I thought I’d broken him when my bike broke and I DNFed which was really disappointing. In the second race I took another holeshot and pretty much checked out – I had a good lead. With about three laps to go I hit a bump wrong on the face of a jump and just washed out and had a crash. I ended up finishing third in that one. In the last race I had a good start but I was struggling for the first few laps. Mel came past me but I knew I could catch him back up. I passed him quite easily but then I over-jumped going into the bomb hole and jerked my wrist pretty bad. After that I was just really struggling. It was a disappointing day really but there are still two rounds left and the championship’s still up for grabs.”

James Dunn MX2 #200

“In the first race I got an okay start and I made up some places to finish 14th which I was really happy with. I got an even better start in the second race and I was running a really good pace. I felt really strong right to the end and I finished fifth – it was just so easy compared to the races where I’ve been trying to fight through. In the last moto I was in the points again but made a mistake and ended up off the track. It took me ages to get going again. It’s still been a good day and it’s good to finally get some good results on the 250.”

Roger Magee: HM Plant KTM UK Team Manager

“Strijbos showed his class again today and he basically annihilated the competition – especially in that last one when he didn’t get such a good start and he reeled them back in from about 18 seconds down to pass them and then cruise on to victory. He just gets better and better every week and we’re looking forward to going to theCzechRepublicwhere I understand he’s won before – afterLatviawho knows what he can do again.

“In MX2 it’s unfortunate that Elliott has lost the red plate. He’s been out since Desertmartin with a wrist injury so he came here without much track time. Unfortunately he had a small technical problem in the first race which caused him to DNF but he came back strong in the second but made a slight mistake and finished third. In the last race he finished as second MX2 rider but seemed to be struggling with fitness – no doubt cause by his lack of riding.

“Hats off to James Dunn today. He really got it together and showed that he can run top six in the MX2 class. We’ve seen him do well in the EMX-125 and hopefully this ride will give him the confidence to go on to bigger and better things for the rest of the year.”

Results

MX1 Overall result

1 Kevin Strijbos (HM Plant KTM UK) 75, 2 Max Anstie (Honda) 64, 3 Shaun Simpson (Monster Energy Yamaha) 62, 4 Martin Barr (Tyco Suzuki) 54, 5 Jamie Law (STR KTM) 44, 6 Nathan Parker (STR KTM) 38, 7 Gert Krestinov (MVR-D Honda) 38, 8 Dorren Coutts (PAR Honda) 22, 9 Alex Snow (Oakleaf Kawasaki) 27, 10 Milko Potisek (Honda) 21

MX1 Series standings

1 Strijbos 388, 2 Simpson 339, 3 Matiss Karro 308, 4 Krestinov 264, 5 Barr 243, 6 Whatley 201, 7 Law 200, 8 Sword 198, 9 Snow 186, 10 Coutts 170

MX2 Overall result

1 Mel Pocock (Monster Energy Yamaha) 57, 2 Nicolas Aubin (Buildbase Honda) 45, 3 Neville Bradshaw (Evo-Tech Stevens Honda) 44, 4 Graeme Irwin (Emberson Yamaha) 39, 5 Elliott Banks-Browne (, 6 Stuart Edmonds (TAS Suzuki) 29, 7 Lewis Tombs (John Banks Honda) 27, 8 James Cottrell (DB Racing Honda) 25, 9 Luke Remmer (Protech Yamaha) 24, 10 James Dunn (HM Plant KTM UK) 23

MX2 Series Standings

1 Pocock 343, 2 Banks-Browne 327, 3 Bradshaw 271, 4 Lenoir 254, 5 Aubin 239, 6 Irwin 239, 7 MacKenzie 235, 8 Edmonds 174, 9 Cottrell 152, 10 Tombs 141… 24 Dunn 41

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