Lands End Trial

Over the Easter weekend I competed in the Lands End Trail, organised by the MCC. This is an event of around 350 miles with 15 observed sections, most of which are on public, unsurfaced roads.

The start was 60 miles from the excellent vegetarian hotel that I was staying and even before reaching it a knew the trip would be a trial. The saddle was hurting me! To make matters worse the cafe was shut. Then it was a further 98 road miles to North Petherton for the proper start of the event.



Here the machines were scrutineered, for the second time, we had a compulsory hour's rest and had excellent cooked breakfasts at Grahams' Truckstop. This was also the time to let the tyres down, I went for 11psi. After a brief road run the sections started. I won't list them in detail but will say that I didn't do very well.



Importantly though I didn't feel any section went badly and I thought I could have done better if I'd tried a little harder, or had more confidence. In previous years I have felt that there was no way I could have cleared some sections. Whether this subtle improvement was due to the Beta or due to the relatively mild weather remains to be seen.

The Beta performed well, as mentioned above, the fails were due to rider error rather than inadequate machinery. I must remember to

• focus on the rear brake when stopping for restarts
• keep on the throttle and keep standing for Blue Hills 2
• keep up a bit of speed in mud to minimise tyre clogging

Including the ride back to the hotel the event took me 688km and by then I hated the seat. That is the only fault with the motorbike. After a rest a had time to explore other aprts of beutiful Cornwall, including St Ives.