Staying on
The conditions at Whilton Mill may have been challenging, but they’ve given Paul Green a taste for endurance racing.
Last September I scratched a little itch and rode my 1995 spec classic Group 4 in a practice session for the British Scooter Endurance Club (BSEC) endurance race, and it felt really good. Over the last six months a few conversations with SRP Racetech supremo Paul Baker led to an offer to ride SRP’s #38 bike in the road class. Erm... let me think about it... yes!!
So I found myself at a rainy Whilton Mill with only a few laps’ practice after the Friday night practice was cut short. Nervous, you bet! Others don’t like it, but for some reason I’m comfortable riding in the rain and a good job too as there was plenty of it forecast for the eight hours ahead of us. Some of my best placings have been in the rain so bizarrely I felt comfortable at the thought of rain ahead. A team-mate started the race and I was due out second, but after just under 40 minutes he binned it, having made up 14 places. There was some significant damage to the suspension and front brake which took some fixing before I could get out on to the damp, and very slippery, Whilton Mill circuit. Kart tracks tend to get a lot of use and there’s always a lot of rubber on the track so once rain falls this becomes very slippery.
All around me people were sliding off and hitting the track. Quite early in the session my karting and scooter racing wet weather experience came into play and I was able to complete lots of passing moves by going off line to where there was grip. I was absolutely buzzing and during my 45-minute session I gained 14 places. After eight years away from competitive track action I was very happy with my performance. The SRP team continued to steadily climb up in the race order, trying to recoup the time lost fixing the bike after the first crash. We peaked around 14th place before a further crash injured another team-mate and the scooter’s broken handlebars meant either a 30-minute-plus job to switch them, or changing to a spare bike and taking the time penalty. We opted for the latter as there were less than 80 minutes remaining. We had set our sights on a top 10 place but as this was now totally lost it was just a case of getting the track time. I headed out for my third stint on the spare bike, which unfortunately had dry tyres fitted so it really was a case of trying to stay on in the rain that was now falling. By the end I had completed three 45-minute stints without crashing out or breaking the bike and had made up places in each session; so I’m taking that as a win!
The BSEC Endurance Series is a huge success with a crazily wide range of machines and abilities of rider being on display but ultimately it’s all about having fun riding scooters on a track. There are absolutely no egos or agendas, with everyone helping each other out. The weather conditions were dreadful for much of the eight hours and with 10 riders despatched to hospital and more than 70 official crashes (!) there were plenty of bent and broken riders as well as some very damaged machinery, yet still there were so many smiling faces.
For many this was their first track experience but it didn’t matter that some riders were quite slow. Endurance racing is about one thing: endurance! Some faster teams were beaten by slower teams who just kept going without crashing or
With 10 riders despatched to hospital and more than 70 official crashes (!) there were plenty of bent and broken riders as well as some very damaged machinery, yet still there were so many smiling faces.
breaking the scooter. This series is quite unusual in that respect, a fairly standard scooter with moderately quick riders who don’t crash or break it can still do pretty well, and that’s a fantastic thing.
Some of the very fastest BSSO riders were in a totally different league, which illustrates the skill involved to race scooters at the highest level, but the attraction of this form of racing is just getting out on track and having fun; it isn’t all about speed. It is the most accessible form of racing and I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed it, in fact I hope to race again at the event in September. It is scooter sport at its best; club mates sharing a scooter, having fun, working as a team, sharing the workload and splitting the cost. I can’t speak highly enough about it!
Just as once scooters are in your blood they never leave you, once you’ve raced the desire to be on track never leaves you either. This series is a fantastic way to get that buzz a couple of times a year with like-minded loons. I love it!
Images: Courtesy of Paul Naylor