close
Trial

European Trial Championship at Santo Stefano d’Aveto (Italy) – Day 2

Italian Matteo Grattarola (Sembenini Montesa, photo1) won the fourth round of the FIM Europe Trial Championship and he is very close to be crowned, as his leadership increased to 75 points with one round left. French Kieran Touly (Sherco, photo2) and Italian Piero Sembenini (Montesa, photo3) triumphed in Junior and Over 40 classes.
In the hottest days of the year, all the European riders appreciated the fresh breeze that Santo Stefano d’Aveto – a small village at almost 1000 mt on sea level, chosen for this penultimate round – offered.
Grattarola – as we already announced – did not like easy sections and never as today he grasped the victory for a while and due to a big mistake of English Dan Peace (Gas Gas), able to control the situation until the last section of the last lap. Peace rode very well in the whole competition. He was leading at the turning point thanks to his card with just 3 penalties. Grattarola was not distant: 7 marks, 2 ahead of Spanish Francesc Moret (Montesa).
It was the same in the second lap until section 4, where Grattarola took an heavy five. Peace seemed to have the victory already in his lands. Grattarola had nothing to lose. And in the last 3 sections the imponderable happened. Peace lost 7 points: 5 in the last one, throwing away a victory almost in his pocket. Grattarola repeated the 3 ‘cleans’ and his third win, stretching of 30 mote points on Moret, third.
False step for Italian leader Sergio Piardi (Beta) in the Junior class. His number one rival, French Kieran Touly (Sherco), rode with incredible calm and did not make any consistent mistake. He scored 4 in the first lap and 3 in the second. Piardi also shared the same points at half competition but then two ‘five’ in the second part cost him to slid in third position, overtaken by his country mate, winner in the Youth class the day before, Carloalberto Rabino, which in this case helped the French rider to close his gap from Piardi. Now Piardi has 370 points, Touly 340.
Among the “over 40” riders, great surprise: for the first time in the series Italian Piero Sembenini (Montesa) topped the podium, beating German leader Markus Kipp (TRS), but the bad luck for Teutonic rider was that two other riders arrived between them. It meant that in one solo race all the advantage of Kipp was almost reset. He is still leading with 345 points but Sembenini is behind for 5 points. Second today after a strong recovering in the second lap for Walter Feltrinelli (Montesa) who beat his countryman Alessandro Brocco (Scorpa), third today and in the overall standings, too.
In the International 2 class, on top local rider Elia Ansaloni (Beta, photo4) while in the most populated International 1, the winner was Luca Poncia (Beta, photo5), the same as yesterday in Youth International.
The fifth and last round will be held at Bilstein, Belgium, next Sunday.
Photos: ©Phototrial.it

 

Tags : Trial