2007 Indoor World Trial Championship Round 3

Palais des Sports, Marseille France - 26/1/2007 - Attendance: 6,000

Missed the Final by a close Margin, again

Small mistakes have been preventing Fuji from the Final Lap appearance this year. In Marseilles he had the motivation high after the disappointing Russian round. But in the end, he missed the chance for the Final Lap by a small margin, as in Russia, but with a single point at the French round.

Fuji started second from the last following the team-mate Lampkin. Another Montesa rider and the series leader Bou was next to start at last. Sections in Marseilles were long and time consuming, and it was a tough challenge to compete within 12 minutes. Fuji though found it more of his favor as the competition was physically demanding. He started with an easy clean at the section one. He tried for a single point at the second section, a slippery Hume pipe sitting after a diagonal entry, but he had to foot twice because the surface was unstable. He dropped two points instead.

Fuji felt well and riding confidently in Marseilles. He was happy having no handicap using French sections too. He marked three consecutive cleans from the section three to five, and seemed that he would finish the Qualification Lap with two points only. It was at the section six, and Fuji was about to finish the section with a jump over at the exit that he made a mistake. It did not seem a difficult challenge for Fuji on that day, but he lost a balance and had to put his foot down to support the bike. He couldn't reach the surface as he was on the hollow point in between the obstacles; he tipped over. "I guess my leg wasn't long enough. I'm the guys like Dougie could have saved it easily." Fuji dropped remorse five points before marking clean to complete seven sections.

The long legged team-mate completed seven sections with five penalty points, but he had 50 seconds time penalty, thus seven points for total. Two team-mates were tie in point before the Double-Lane. Bou, meanwhile, wasn't so lucky at Marseilles damaging the front brake at the exit of the section three. Not aware of the warped front disc, the crew changed the front brake system but the disc. Repair job took only about one and a half minute, but Bou restated with a problem remaining. He dropped ten more points after the incident to finish seven sections with 11 points.

Fuji along with Lampkin wondered if there would be a team order to help Bou for the Final. The only way for them to do was to make a full mark error at the Double-Lane. However, riding the bike with a problem must have affected Bou's motivation, and he lost the DL against Fajardo to extend his penalty points. Then it became needless worries for fellow team-mates, although there has never been any team order within the team in the past, that there was nothing two could do to help Bou.

It was a straight match at the DL between Fuji and Lampkin for their first Final Lap appearance of the season. Average speed of DL in Marseilles was low, and it was a technical one. Fuji loves DL, and he led Lampkin by a bike length as he coming back to the return leg. But he made a mistake to drop the front wheel a little too short and stuck in between the obstacles. While Fuji fighting hard to bring the wheel back up, the team-mate passed him by, thus Fuji lost the ticket for the Final Lap.

Fuji thought he should have been there to compete when watching Lampkin at the Final Lap, especially the team-mate finished 18 points behind the winner Raga. It made Fuji more frustrated about the mistake and the results, and made him even more motivated for the coming rounds.

Quote from Fujigas:

I feel good and confident for this year's Indoor events, so I am very frustrated the way it's going so far. Once again I was so close for the Final, but there is a little something that I cannot get over with. For the two consecutive rounds I missed the Final because of my mistakes. We are going back to Barcelona, the heart of Spanish teams, but I will keep it up and try to be strong.

pix: indoortrial.com

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