Hogtoberfest this year was tinged with sadness as we remembered our friend and fellow skater/racer Ed Brockman who passed away on 6th October after an 11-year battle with cancer, our race meeting was dedicated to his memory.
The sun shone down on us as we set up, Chris made a start on course setting while Louis was helping run the sign up and registration desk. Everyone mucked in so in no time at all we were set up and almost ready to roll. A few test runs of the Hybrid course uncovered a couple of sketchy bits that required a bit of tinkering and tweaking but once sorted we were ready for practice to begin. A late running Vincent Tanguy appeared just as practice got underway, but he was soon ready to race.
Then came our first casualty of the day, resident Swede Olle Bauer came off up by the start ramps and dislocated his shoulder before even going through a cone!
Qualifying Times
There were only a small number of entrants and once qualifying was over the riders were bracketed into two groups of eight. The ‘A Group’ would race first and was comprised of Louis, Chris C, Dobie, Paul T-C, Dill, Vincent, Noah and John Nicholas. The round of 8 saw Dobie, Paul, Noah and John heading for an early bath leaving Louis facing Dill and Chris would be matched against Vincent in the round of 4. Louis cruised by Dill, the margin almost 3 seconds over the two legs and Vincent dispatched Chris to face Dill in the Consolation Round by a similar margin. Racing was very close in the Consolation Round, but both Chris and Dill picked up cone penalties in their runs, but it was Chris that would take the third-place spot on the podium by 0.37 secs. The final between Louis and Vincent was another close-run thing, both riders picking up a cone penalty, Vincent came out in front by 0.15 seconds. In the second run Louis picked up another cone penalty while Vincent ran clean and took first place.
Trevor Hickey, Simon, Alec, Trevor Baker, Rich, Mike Fish, Paul Coupe and myself were prepared to do battle in the B group. Trevor H. knocked newbie Simon out of contention after he DQ’d his first run leaving too much to make up in the second. Alec versus Trevor Baker was a bit of a cone-fest, but it was Alec that went through on fewer cones. In their first heat Mike and Rich tied, Rich DQ’d and Mike hit 11 cones (10 is a DQ) leaving it all to do in the second run. This time Rich ran smooth and clean, Mike wasn’t so fortunate and took out 5 cones at the bottom of the course meaning The One boss went into the round of 4 with comparative ease. The less said about my efforts the better, I should have opted to stay behind the timing table instead of trying to race as well. The long and short of it, I double DQ’d giving Paul Coupe a very easy journey into the next round. In the round of 4 Trevor went through without too much trouble, Alec hit five cones in the first run and DQ’d in the second. In the other heat Paul Coupe took the first run and Rich just edged over the line ahead of Paul in the second one. However, Paul was just that little bit quicker and advanced to the final by the tiniest of margins, just 0.1 sec.!
In the Consolation Round Alec picked up the third spot after Rich picked up four cone penalties over the two legs to Alec’s 1, leaving the McLaren man smiling at his podium finish. The final between ice cold Paul and fireman Trev was a very even match, both riders were in unison midway through the course on both runs. The only thing that separated them was the fact that Trev hit three cones over the two legs and Paul didn’t, so it was a victory for Paul and a second place for Trev.
With the Hybrid done and dusted it was time to break everything down and head for home.
After the perfect sunshine we experienced on Saturday afternoon we were looking forward to the same on Sunday for the GS, but it was not to be. The rain started and just got progressively heavier as the morning went on, so we sat chatting over numerous cups of tea and coffee in the café. Previously whenever there has been down time between racing we have had a never-ending supply of Ed’s skate tales of yore to keep us entertained but sadly no longer.
At lunchtime we pulled the plug on any hope of racing and began the soggy breakdown and pack up, that was it for another year.
Hybrid Slalom Results
A Group
- Vincent Tanguy (FRA)
- Louis Selby
- Chris Charalambous
- Dill Hill
- Paul Taylor Crush
- John Nicholas
- Dobie Campbell
- Noah Ellison
B Group
- Paul Coupe
- Trevor Hickey
- Alec Brown
- Richard Searle
- Trevor Baker
- Rob Ashby
- Mike Fish
- Simon T G Wells