2005 World Trial Championship Round 9
3-4/9/2005 Gefrees, Germany
8th and 3rd - Title slipped away from Fujinami
WTC returned in action after the summer break, and the penultimate round
of the season took place at Gefrees in Germany. Lots of natural obstacles
were used for section set up creating the classic stage for Outdoor competition.
Having only 3 games to go before the season is up, Fujinami needed nothing
but winning both days, and hoping his rival would struggle.
Fuji had nice practice sessions during holiday, and he looked very strong
at the training area in Germany too. Watching the way he practicing, many
felt that Fuji had a good chance to defend his title.
Saturday, September 3rd
Raga was lucky at the ballot to pick the final starting order. Tony Bow
picked the 2nd best, and the 3rd from the last went to Fuji. While both Raga
and Fuji having a pressure for the title battle, it was Freixa who showed
a strong ride on the lap 1. By the half way mark at the section 7, Freixa
had 13 points, while Fuji building up 23 points. Raga too having a tough
time and he had 20 points by then.
Apart from the pressure for winning, Fuji had a small problem with his bike
on Saturday. He wasn't sure what was wrong, but the problem must have affected
his riding as he fived the sections, in which having a tendency to go either
clean or five and required precise control.
Freixa maintained his rhythm to finish 1st on the lap with 18 points. Raga
rode better at the later sections to finish 2nd with 22 points. Fuji continued
to struggle, and he finished down in 8th with 37 points.
Fuji couldn't turn things around so much on the lap 2, and he finished 8th
for the day. Raga meanwhile bounced back on the lap to finish 5 points better
than Freixa, and he won the day by one point advantage. As a result, the
championship point gap between Fuji and Raga became 25 points - the biggest
gap ever reached in this season. Mathematically, Fuji had a chance to stop
Raga, but he needed to win while Raga finishing with zero point at one of
two games remaining. That was very unlikely to be happened.
Sunday, September 4th
Finishing 8th on the previous day, Fuji started early on Sunday - around
20 minutes earlier than Raga's starting time. There were Kuroyama, Pascuet
and Blazusiak with Fuji when the day got underway, but Kuroyama had problem
at the section 1 so as Blazusiak getting injured after crashing at the early
stage. Fuji soon found himself competing along with James Dabill, who recently
became the new Junior class champion. It was somewhat awkward to see the
man who was fighting for the series title riding at such position.
Fuji rode better on Sunday, and on the lap 1 he avoided taking five except
at the section 9. It was the section, where Fuji fived on both laps on Saturday.
He chose the line he believed the only way to mark clean, but he failed and
suffered maximum points. Later the top riders tried the different line than
Fuji, and they safely marked cleans.
Fuji had to ride patiently to recover from early mistakes on the lap 2.
His effort paid off and he rode faultlessly after the section 8 to mark 8
consecutive cleans. It wasn't enough to bring his position better than the
lap 1, and he finished the day 3rd with 31 points. It was Raga who won the
day 2 after showing brilliant ride with a total of 17 penalty points.
Although Fuji rode much better on Sunday, there was no smile on Fuji's face
at the podium. As the day 2 was over, the point gap became 30 points with
one round remaining, thus Raga clinched 2005 WTC championship. For Fuji,
it was already painful to see the title taken away from his hands, but it
was frustrating to stand along side to celebrate his rival who just made
a perfect style to clinch the title with the day's victory.
Quote from Fujigas:
World Championship 2005
Gefrees |
Saturday |
|
Rider |
Make |
L1 |
L2 |
TO |
Pts |
CL |
1 |
Adam Raga |
GasGas |
22 |
15 |
0 |
37 |
13 |
2 |
Marc Freixa |
Montesa |
18 |
20 |
0 |
38 |
12 |
3 |
Dougie Lampkin |
Montesa |
29 |
22 |
0 |
51 |
14 |
4 |
Jeroni Fajardo |
GasGas |
28 |
26 |
0 |
54 |
12 |
5 |
Albert Cabestany |
Sherco |
28 |
30 |
0 |
58 |
12 |
6 |
Graham Jarvis |
Sherco |
32 |
31 |
3 |
66 |
6 |
7 |
Antonio Bou |
Beta |
37 |
31 |
0 |
68 |
10 |
8 |
Takahisa Fujinami |
Honda |
37 |
31 |
0 |
68 |
9 |
9 |
Kenichi Kuroyama |
Beta |
49 |
33 |
0 |
82 |
5 |
10 |
Tadeusz Blazusiak |
GasGas |
50 |
45 |
0 |
95 |
0 |
11 |
Jordi Pascuet |
GasGas |
56 |
45 |
0 |
101 |
1 |
12 |
Fumitaka Nozaki |
Scorpa |
61 |
42 |
0 |
103 |
7 |
13 |
Shaun Morris |
GasGas |
54 |
50 |
0 |
104 |
3 |
14 |
James Dabill |
Beta |
55 |
52 |
0 |
107 |
4 |
15 |
Sam connor |
Sherco |
59 |
52 |
0 |
112 |
1 |
L1: Lap1 L2: Lap2 TO:
Time Over Pts: Penalty Point CL:Clean |
Sunday |
|
Rider |
Make |
L1 |
L2 |
TO |
Pts |
CL |
1 |
Adam Raga |
GasGas |
8 |
9 |
0 |
17 |
21 |
2 |
Antonio Bou |
Beta |
15 |
11 |
0 |
26 |
19 |
3 |
Takahisa Fujinami |
Honda |
14 |
17 |
0 |
31 |
17 |
4 |
Dougie Lampkin |
Montesa |
27 |
10 |
0 |
37 |
16 |
5 |
Graham Jarvis |
Sherco |
24 |
13 |
0 |
37 |
15 |
6 |
Albert Cabestany |
Sherco |
11 |
26 |
0 |
37 |
13 |
7 |
Marc Freixa |
|
26 |
20 |
0 |
46 |
14 |
8 |
Kenichi Kuroyama |
Beta |
24 |
25 |
0 |
49 |
10 |
9 |
Jeroni Fajardo |
GasGas |
18 |
36 |
0 |
54 |
16 |
10 |
Fumitaka Nozaki |
Scorpa |
39 |
33 |
0 |
72 |
7 |
11 |
Jordi Pascuet |
GasGas |
35 |
39 |
0 |
74 |
7 |
12 |
James Dabill |
Beta |
37 |
40 |
0 |
77 |
6 |
13 |
Shaun Morris |
GasGas |
39 |
46 |
0 |
85 |
7 |
14 |
Tadeusz Blazusiak |
GasGas |
48 |
41 |
0 |
89 |
2 |
15 |
Martin Kroustek |
Beta |
55 |
54 |
0 |
109 |
3 |
L1: Lap1 L2: Lap2 TO:
Time Over Pts: Penalty Point CL:Clean |
Ranking |
1 |
Adam Raga |
235 |
2 |
Takahisa Fujinami |
205 |
3 |
Dougie Lampkin |
201 |
4 |
Albert Cabestany |
199 |
5 |
Antonio Bou |
162 |
6 |
Marc Freixa |
157 |
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