Dorset's Next Prodigy

You heard it here first!!

For all those that might have found the recent Wednesday evening event at Rogershill Raceway a little difficult.

Meet 'Ollie Saville', 5 years old, on a PW50 who happily circulated the enduro course on his own, including the technical wooded section.

To make it completely clear, he did struggle slightly on the extreme stage, but we believe this was purely down to the ground clearance of his PW, rather than his inability.

An upside-down excursion into some 5ft nettles, potentially would call an end to the day's riding, but fair play, after some tears, he cracked on to clear the course numerous times.

Possibly the only way to get Britain's talent to the world stage in years to come.

Rogershill Raceway Evening H&H Round 1

Round 1 of the Rogershill Raceway Evening Events organised by SCEC saw a 130+ rider turnout on a hot Wednesday night.

Luckily, a 3 day long heatwave was passing just in time for the start of the 2 hour race. A number of helping hands had put together a course to be more challenging throughout, with a good mix of cross country and expert/extreme routes, attracting top riders such as Daryl Boulter and Simon Wakely.

A good strong field lined up with the championship and expert riders setting off together. Stan Watt from Front Row GB decided to use the KTM690 Enduro R with the intention to take all the expert and extreme routes.

At the drop of the flag, Stan got away mid-pack but by the third corner had moved past a number of riders into 5th position. As the front runners started to pull away at the beginning of the first lap, a disappointed Simon Wakely with a fuel problem on the Husqavarna, retired early moving Stan up to 4th place.

Finding a rhythm early on, Stan made up another place into 3rd behind the leading Daryl Boulter and Mark Cornick. The first 3 laps saw Stan hold a stable position , 20 seconds ahead of Danny Hall but both riders dropping back from the leading two. The power of the KTM690 made up for its more difficult handling to that of Danny Hall's BMW450 and Stan was able to maintain the exact pace of the 4th placed rider.

Stan's first mistake on lap four in the extreme section, (not clearing the water barrels on the first attempt) allowed Danny Hall to take over his 3rd position. Both riders fought hard and stayed together until Stan made a similar mistake in the extreme section of lap 5, when attempting a passing move on Danny Hall. This allowed Steve Harding and two other riders to move ahead dropping Stan back to 7th position.

Stan pushed hard on the KTM690 Enduro in an attempt to make up time and at least make the same number of laps as the front riders. Although, there were no further mistakes, Stan missed an additional lap by 24 seconds, losing substantial opportunity to make any further ground on the front 5 riders and had to settle for a strong 6th position after Daryl Boulter retired with a mechanical breakdown.

FRGB

"Rally Dakar" - KTM withdraws!

The limiting of motorcycles with a displacement of 450 cc forces the long term dominator of the Dakar Rally to withdraw.

Following the announcement at a press conference on June 4, 2009 of the French "ASO" - the organisers of the "South American Dakar" that from 2010, only motorcycles with a maximum displacement of 450 cc will be permitted to compete, KTM, after eight consecutive victories, has decided to immediately accept the consequences and announces its withdrawal from the "Dakar".
The company will no longer be represented at the rally in South America either with an official factory team or a KTM-supported team. At the same time, KTM underlines that the company remains committed to rally sport and will now concentrate its efforts on the world championship and other important rallies.

The organiser's short term change to the rules, designed to end the dominance of KTM, and which comes without any advance warning, hits the KTM factory hard. Today, just six months before the start - and at a time when not only the factory team but also dozens of private teams are deep in preparations for this extremely complex rally, the immediate withdrawal of the worldwide market leader of offroad sports motorcycle is the only possible consequence.

"Every sport regulation needs changes and adjustments to new developments to retain an interest in it, but this also require the appropriate lead times. We have the entire material for the 690 Rally motorcycles for our factory team as well as that for 50 customers' motorcycles in our storage facility ready to be constructed in June. Riders' contracts have been finalised and all the team members have been engaged. The financial consequences that results from this decision are enormous. Quite apart from this, we are shocked by the organiser's lack of loyalty, above all because of the huge efforts we made following the cancellation of the Dakar in 2008 by contributing to the new edition - even during a period of extreme economic crisis," said KTM Motor Sport Advisor and "Rally Legend" Heinz Kinigadner in a first statement.

Following the decision for the deployment of 450cc motorcycles, which are unthinkably unsuitable for use in long distance rallies, KTM can no longer economically justify a commitment to be engaged in the Dakar in the future.

KTM Motor Sport Director Winfried Kerschhaggl: "Rally sport serves to prove the efficiency and stability of our large volume series single cylinder. There is no question that we will remain active in rally sport! Having said that, for KTM, the rally in South America is now history. We will now fully concentrate on the Rally World Championship and we will seek out alternatives. Maybe we will soon again see full KTM Rally engagement on African soil - back to the roots!"

With its commitment to rally sports, KTM naturally takes the obligations to its long term worldwide customers seriously because it is they who have decided to put their trust in the products and in the unique service of the Austrian company for rally sport by choosing KTM motorcycles.