James Dabill and his new TRW Montesa
By TMX Archives on 12th Jan 07
JAMES Dabill travelled to Bergamo, Italy at the weekend to pick up his TRW Montesa 4RT in order to get down to some serious practise on the four-stroke, all ready for the 2007 season - and Trials and Motocross News had shadowed Jimbo's journey across Europe and back in order to nail the very first pictures of the boy and his exciting new steed!
And the new bike is not all that will be new in the Dabill camp this year. James has also signed-up 20-year-old Jack Lee to be his full time Assistant. As from NOW, Jack will be with James all the way as the Yorkshire ace continues in his bid to make it to the top echelon of World Trials. A comprehensive training schedule is planned with Jack joining James three days a week for some really intensive, meaningful training sessions.
The TRW Montesa is a hand-built gem and this is the first of three bikes to be completed that are for James's exclusive use. This model will stray in Britain, another will be completed in the next two weeks while the final World Championship model will be the last to be completed and will incorporate any mods that James has found necessary as he familiarises himself with the new bike.
The TRW 4RT is a full 300cc and this has been achieved by engineering a new liner into the Honda barrel. This is the kind of thing that the TRW engineering group specialises in and is a further development of the 280cc version that they ran in 2006 with veteran Italian ace Diego Bosis the development rider. The engine management electrics are also brand new and feature two-stage mapping that can be changed at the flick of a switch, similar to the HRC factory bikes. And a further development of this is expected to be available to James before the start of the World Championship season.
The bike sports a flat tank, like the HRC bikes, the down-tubes are machined out to save weight, there are trick-looking aluminium fork yokes, a titanium over-sized front pipe amongst a whole host of weight-saving, performance boosting mods.
A TRW mechanic has been assigned to James to look after his World Championship bikes while Jack will spanner the British-based machine.
The signing of Jack Lee could just be the ingredient that gives James the extra edge in 2007. A full-time Assistant is a must for World Championship success and Jack has a great pedigree. Jack is the son of respected trials dealer John Lee of Higham Ferrers and not only is he a level-headed lad of National trials standard he is also a fully qualified Honda mechanic! John is 100% behind Jack and has urged the lad to make the most of this opportunity.
Jack and James were due to get together this week to hammer out a season-long plan of attack and a three-week session in Spain alongside Dougie Lampkin is definitely on the agenda.
When it was announced that James was quitting his TTT Beta team to join a private Montesa team there were a few raised eyebrows - but the way things are shaping at the moment things could hardly look better!
Don't miss T+MX next week for an EXCLUSIVE interview with James!