Cooking up a Sheff special

Without being ham-strung by an overly restrictive live TV schedule (although it was filmed under live conditions) the event ran super smoothly.

 

In the main, everything eventually panned-out much as you'd expect, apart from Adam Raga being knocked-out in the Qualifying stage.

 

This was even more of a shock because during the pre-event warm-up Adam actually looked really sharp and on top of his game.

 

Former World Indoor and Outdoor champ Raga has really struggled living in the shadow of  Bou since Toni began his world domination on the Repsol Montesa.

 

But, over the latter half of last season, particularly at the last round of the 2012 outdoor series at Carlisle, we began to see some of the old Raga confidence and style return, which must be due in some measure to the influence of Dougie Lampkin.

 

Backstage at Sheffield, Raga was matching Bou in the skill stakes and I genuinely thought that he was ready to give his arch rival a hard time. 

 

Adam remained surprisingly upbeat following his shock exit saying, "I made one stupid mistake on the oil bottles and that was that. I am very happy with my riding right now, it is going well but not happy with the result!”

 

In the post trial interview Bou paid tribute to Sherco's Albert Cabestany and said that Cabes was riding very well, but followed this up saying, "When we looked at the sections I thought that they were easy and that I would have to ride perfect or it was possible for someone to beta me if I made a mistake. "Cabestany showed that this was absolutely correct so I am very happy to take the win.”

 

James Dabill rode to a fine fourth place in his wild card ride and it was good to see that he was not satisfied with this, "Third would have been better!” stated a confident Dibs immediately afterwards.

 

It was not quite as good news for Britain's two other competitors Michael Brown and Jack Challoner. Michael has never been happy riding indoors but local rider Jack has good history at Sheffield and the Beta rider was disappointed at going out early.

 

His Top Trial Team Beta was certainly the stand-out bike on display with its two-tone colour scheme of orange on the right and yellow on the left.

 

There is an awful lot of work in the bike and team boss Michele Bosi told me that work included a special, lighter crankshaft, tuned barrel and clutch, a very special Showa wear shock, special one-off front forks and much detail work beside.

 

"It is a very special bike that we make!” confirmed Michele.