This Sunday the Iveston and Satley MCC hosted the second round of the 2018 MAXXIS British sidecarcross championships at the PJMX circuit near Blyth in Northumberland. With unusually warm sunny weather the club had to work hard to keep the dust down which they just about managed to do although they were helped by the fact that the wind was taking the dust away from the paddock and the spectators.
The turnout of riders was disappointing with many riders form the south being absent as well as at least one official. When you consider the miles that riders from the north and from Ireland travel to race in the south it must very disappointing that southerners won't travel north.
As there were only twenty-three riders present and one was injured in practice virtually everyone who could manage to complete half the number of laps completed by the race winner would score points in at least one of the three races - Is this really how championship points should be earned?
In timed practice Stuart Brown / Joe Millard made their intentions known posting a time over three seconds quicker than Gary Moulds / Steve Kirwin with Brett Wilkinson and his now fit passenger Dan Chamberlain third fastest.
Brown continued to show everyone else how it was done in all three races gaining the holeshot in each race, posting the fastest lap in each race and never being headed in the 35 laps completed in the three races. An awesome display that the others could only watch from a distance.
In the first race of the day Brown led from Wilkinson with Moulds third and Hodges / Ide fourth. Setting themselves a real challenge were Jake Brown / Zac Snell who stopped after just a few corners on lap one and were left dead last. When they got going again they had their work cut out but were soon in amongst the slower riders and moving nearer to the front.
The leaders stayed in the same order for the whole race whilst Brown / Snell kept plugging away and finished in sixth place.
The second leg was once again headed by Brown from gate to flag but this time Hodges took second place after turn one and held off Wilkinson for nearly half the race when a neat move on a tight bend changed the places round. Hodges came under pressure from Moulds for a while but managed to fend off the Irishman and came home in third place behind Wilkinson.
In the last race of the day Brown led Wilkinson with the Horton brothers in third place. After the dust settled around turn one it became apparent that at least six bikes had been involved in a pile up including Horton. Despite a nasty looking cut to the driver's arm they got going again but were right at the back.
Brown pulled away from Moulds who had taken Wilkinson but very soon those places were reversed and stayed that way until the flag.
Brown now leads the championship by twelve points from Wilkinson. Moulds, Hodges and J.Brown are the next three separated by just ten points.
The next round is at Foxhill on the first July hosted by Nora Quad.