The Italian Gianluca Tournour is the leader of the general standings – Photo by Mario Candellone
After three rounds in which three different riders topped the podium, there is much anticipation over the next two weekends to crown the 2015 champion of the FIM Europe Trial Championship.
In this upcoming Sunday – for the second consecutive year – it will be the turn of blazoned Bilstain, in North-East of Belgium, to host the European series: a large private area, well known to all old Trial fans, because it was the scene of important world rounds held in the 80’s.
The nowadays leader of the top class, Italian Gianluca Tournour (Gas Gas) demonstrated in the previous rounds to have the right skill to face the huge rocks which are typical of this terrain. But his lead on Spaniard Francisc Moret (Vertigo) and Frenchman Steven Coquelin (Gas Gas) with whom he shared the victories, is so smooth that whoever will be able to climb the highest step of the podium in Bilstain, could take the leadership immediately.
This is not going to be the only reason to watch this event, because the kermes is starting on Saturday with the second and penultimate round of the Women and Youth series. Italian Sara Trentini (Sherco) is ready to defend her primate in the overall standing, having triumphed in Pietramurata (Italy), four months ago, but German Theresa Bauml (Ossa) is in search of a possible revenge. And her compatriot Bianca Huber (Gas Gas) will be willing to insert in this battle, too.
In the Youth class British Toby Martyn (Beta) will try to defend himself from Italian Sergio Piardi, who was able to threaten his victory in the first round in Pietramurata. But other good very young riders might have made many improvements in this long time, so any forecast is quite ventured.
In the next day besides the top riders it will be interesting to see the reaction of the Junior class leader, Frenchman Pierre Sauvage (Sherco), beaten by Italian Luca Corvi (Scorpa) in the very last round, after two convincing wins. Now Corvi is more confident to fill the gap to the first place in the overall standing. Norwegian Julian Bernsten (Gas Gas) is ready to take advantage of any false step done by the first two.
In the Over 40 class, the winner of last two rounds, Slovakian Vladimir Kothay (Ossa), in case of victory, will clinch the title, because in this class only three results are used to compute the final classification. Of course he will have hard time in defeating two rivals that in the other rounds have been very close to him: Dutch John Van Veelen (Ossa) and Italian Walter Feltrinelli (Sherco).
