Northern Downhill Series, Rd3 Scratchmere Scar

This weekend was the 3rd round of the Northern Downhill series at Scratchmere Scar, just outside of Penrith. The track was short with the fastest time being a 1.07 but it was really fun and had a good variation of tight twisty turns, rock sections and a fast open road crossing finishing with a sprint in the field. The Sun was out all weekend and the track was dusty, the race was also filled to capacity with almost 95 riders.
Saturday the uplift started at 9.30 and there was a very chilled out feel and a real good atmosphere and everyone seemed to be loving the track, as the day went on the track got rougher and it was getting harder to dial every line every run.
But when it all came together you could hit some pretty impressive speeds of the natural rock kicker and across the fire round and jumping into the lower flatter rocky sections where you really needed to carry speed.
With such an easy push up route a few riders decided it was just as quick to push to the top. There was also a good turn out of spectators over both days for a regional race, but actions over Saturday night dampened the mood a little with an Iron Horse Sunday being stolen from the race site. Always a shame to here of shameless thieves taking peoples pride and joy and this is now 2 weeks on the trot after a bike being taken from Llangollen last weekend.
Sunday morning was again glorious sunshine and people grabbed a few more practice runs before the 2 race runs took place.
After two race runs the Podiums were as follows:

Elite men
1 #1 Peter WILLIAMS 1:07.624
2 #2 Brad ILLINGWORTH 1:15.254 +0:07.630
Expert men
1 #5 Liam LITTLE 1:09.877
2 #8 Peter WALTON 1:11.832 +0:01.955
3 #7 Steven TURNBULL 1:12.703 +0:02.826

Juvenile men
1 #131 James PURVIS 1:22.652
2 #130 Jack HODGKINSON 1:28.149 +0:05.497
3 #135 Bradley SWINBANK 1:30.427 +0:07.775

Youth men
1 #101 Dan FARLEY 1:15.749
2 #103 Ryan POTTER 1:17.280 +0:01.531
3 #100 Rory MCRITCHIE 1:17.969 +0:02.220

Junior men
1 #75 Andy FARLEY 1:16.279
2 #95 Aidan WARREN 1:20.940 +0:04.661
3 #86 Chris TYLER 1:21.594 +0:05.315
Senior men
1 #52 Michael VICKERS 1:12.810
2 #50 Philip ASHBRIDGE 1:13.143 +0:00.333
3 #67 Chris ASHWORTH 1:16.024 +0:03.214

Master men
1 #30 Russ HARLAND 1:12.744
2 #32 Russ CLARK 1:14.548 +0:01.804
3 #31 Jason CAVILL 1:16.066 +0:03.322

Veteran men
1 #17 Darren HOWARTH 1:15.846
2 #20 Gerald HODGKINSON 1:18.922 +0:03.076
3 #24 Craig BUTLER 1:20.301 +0:04.455

Grand Veteran men
1 #15 Alan TURNBULL 1:30.846

Youth women
1 #99 Emma WHITAKER 2:23.147
Master women
1 #98 Gina ROBERTSON 2:24.232

Thanks to Carl and the Northern Downhill crew for another awesome race weekend, the next round is a new venue called Ramsgill on the 20th and 21st of August, get your entries in now at http://www.northerndownhill.co.uk/Northern_Downhill/The_home_of_Northern_Downhill_2011.html