appea led rohim .
"We don't typically have sections
like that in a National Enduro,"
Hawkins said. "Most enduros have
short, quick sections, and ifyou mess
up, there's no way to make up for
mistakes, In a long section you can
make a mistake and recover and
keep charging. I like to think like a
runaway train in a section like that,
where Iget in, get a rhythm going and
then just get on the gas and keep
charging, going faster all the time. I
think most guys get in and get comfortable, and then they level off their
pace and just ride. I try not to do
that ."
It worked on this day. Hawkins
blazed through the section, dropping
a three through the first check and a
six at the section check-out , and no
one else came within four points of
him - and that was in spite of an epic
crash that left him with two painfully
mashed and bleeding fingers on his
left hand. He followed that up with
beating everyone else by at least a
point at the final check of the day, and
he turned in a 35-point scorecard.
"Hopefully, the momentum will continue, " he said,
talkingabout the rest of the
series. "Th is one 's past ,
ain't nothing you can do
about it any more, so the
only thing to do is get
ready for the next
one."
Hawk ins'
c losest
competitor was series points leader
David Lykke, who is contesting the series
this year on a KTM and seeming to enjoy
it. Lykke might have been more of a factor in the race if he hadn't left the starting
line a minute and a halflate because, "The
clock in my van was om" he said. That
gave Lykke the dubious distinction of
being the only M rider to lose time at the
first check, where he spotted the rest of
the field a point. He made up for it by
matching Hawkins' score at the end of the
next section , then beating him through
the section following. The next section
saw them match each other, but at the
next one Hawkins started reaching his
stride and gained a point. Next was the
epic 28-mile section, where Lykke did
better than any other M with a five and
then a nine, but it wasn't good enough
to top Hawkins' 3-6. He finished up with
a 42.
The fastest off the line was local ECEA
rider and ISDE Junior Trophy team rider
Wally Palmer,who , at 18years old, knows
the meaning of the word "pinned."
Unfortunately for him, Wally went a little
too fast off the start and burned the first
check. That was two points he didn't
need , but amazingly enough he
made it up after the checkouts of the next two sections,
dropping a 10 and a three where
Hawkins dropped an I I and
four. Palmer's "make
it sing and wing it"
approach
"
worked well
at the early
sections and
