Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126303
Martin Lampkin chugged his 348cc Bultaco to win his third Belgian round of the World Trials Championship in the past six years. Rob Shepard guides his 310cc long-stroke Honda through the trees at Belgium. where he finish second. World ChampionshIp TrIals SerIes · Round Three Lampkin back on form By Dave W ilcock BILSTAIN, BELGIUM, FEB . 26 Battling Martin Lampkin gave them a taste of cold steel in Belgium on Sunday - and preserved an incredible record of British victories in World and European title competition. In chalking up his third Belgian win in six years the Yorkshire Bultaco factor; ace brought · . • II 12 . B rttam s ta y to consecutive 22 wins and broke the magic spell that Finland's World Champion, Yrjo Vesterinen , seemed to have cast on the cham pionship series. British champion Rob Shepherd, using a new frame on the factory Hon da , pushed Vesterinen down into third place as traction at last returned to the championship. Two days earlier, with snow and ice covering the wooded Bilstain trials park, 12 miles from the German border at Aachen, a third win for icespecialist Vesterinen had looked well on the cards. But the conditions he had enjoyed in Ulster and Wales dissolved in the sun , and with it , Vesterinen's chance of scoring his first ever win on Belgian soil. Breaking one of the new Bultaco a ir dampers at mid-distance on this super 56 -mile, three-lap course, the World Champion's aura of invin cibilit~ disappeared and tension crept onto hISface . After losing 20 minutes of his sevenhour allowance, to replace the damper, Vesterinen briefly snatched back the lead that Lampkin had taken on the first lap . But the sporting crowds · estimated at 5,000 . saw Lampkin at his very best. pulling it back on the final lap to win by eight marks from Shepherd. Belgian Champion jean -Marie Lejeune and Montesa teammate Jean Luc Colson made good use of the ground they know so well to take the next two places. But with Mick An drews, Malcolm Rathmell and Nigel Birkett all ge,ting into the points, it wasn 't a bad day for the British. Joint sixth after the first lap of 17 sections that might well have been anywhere in England, Shepherd mat ched Vesterinen by losing only 14 marks on the second lap. The Honda man still had a real chance of victory with just a handful of sections left, but a dab here, a prod - there, and an uncharacteristic five on the final stream and mud bank section ended Shep's hopes. Andrews. out for the first lime on the first of the modified 520cc Yamahas he plans to build for sale, had to cope with a flooding carburetor throughout. It caused him to top up his tank four times and he used almost four gallons in the 56 m iles. Malcolm Rathmell , try ing hard to win back confidence after an off- spell that couldn't have come at a more crucial time , tried a new set of softer front forks on his works Suzuki and seemed to be making some headway. Apart from running out of fuel. he had no real disasters . But regular fooling on the soft muddy slopes and over the vast rock boulders at Bilstain pushed his score above 90 . and eighth place. Early on in the first lap, he sue cessfully staved off a five in the downhill sixth section when a rock knocked the Suzuki into neutral. for cing him to attack a long steep exit in first gear. But he made it . America's lone runner , Bernie Schreiber. was having his share of trouble too . It was here in Belgium exactly a year ago that the IS·year·old Bultaco wizard crashed into the world reckoning with a solid fifth place, but now , on a considerably less severe course, Schreiber struggled. Typical of his luck was the sixth section. where on a downhill run in bottom gear, he stalled. Frantically trying to bounce the Bultaco back to life. he succeeded only in getting a dose of full lock . and came off in a heap. "T h a t's my worst performance in the world championships since I star' ted" he said after finishing 15th and failing to add to the four points scored in Ulster and Wales in previous weeks . French National Champion Christian Desnoyers was set to put down his senior rival Charles Coutard for a second week until a back wheel puncture five sections into the final lap poleaxed him . Running short of time in which to return to the start for a spare tube, Desnoyers continued on the rim of his Montesa and lost a colossal 5 I marks that shunted him right out of the run • oJ mng. It wasn't all easy for Martin Lam pkin. He started in a flap after losing the route marking and lost 15 minutes before returning to the start and beginning again. 1 A reversed marker arrow also sent Coutard and Andrews on an un necessary detour, while Rob Edwards , a fraction out of the points in l l th place, had to contend with a pun -