This weekend Rafe headed to Marshfield for the fourth and final round of the NORA92 British Cup Championship.
The weekend before Rafe had a nasty crash whilst mountain biking and broke a rib, he travelled to VIP for the Motoloko day the following Tuesday and realised that he was struggling a little with the injury, but if he rested for a few days before Marshfield, he should be ok to give 100% at the last round of the British Cup.
Going into the weekend Rafe was sitting 4th in the Championship, there was 16 points between him and a podium finish. With 4 races to make up the difference and double points on offer, finishing on the podium was a strong possibility.
Rafe headed out to qualifying and was pleased to achieve the fourth fastest lap, giving him a good gate pic for the weekend.
Race 1 – Marshfield has a steep uphill start straight, and once over the gates, the bike bogged a little, but Rafe was quick to dip the clutch and headed up the start straight with the pack of riders. He quickly progressed up into fourth place, his pace quickened as he ticked off the laps and with a clever overtake manoeuvre, Rafe moved into third place. Rafe was where he needed to be, thinking of the overall championship, he settled into third place and concentrated on being consistent. He crossed the line in third place – Exactly where he needed to be, gaining an eight point advantage towards the podium.
The heavens opened and a heavy downpour stopped racing for the day, the event organisers planned to run the remainder of the races the following day.
Day 2 / Race 2 – The start of racing was delayed from 9am to 9.30am, which saw the track team finish off prepping the track and gave it time to dry out. Rafe got a cracking start, and flew up the start straight, unfortunately the bike hit neutral causing Rafe to topple from the bike, almost dead last he had to spend the race working through the pack and finished in 10th Place. This was a massive disappointment, but with 2 further races, a podium win for the championship was possible.
The other races from block 2 finished and as block 3 started, so did the rain….
The rain was biblical and heavy, the organisers made the difficult decision to end the meeting, which also ended any chance of a Podium finish for Rafe in the 2025 NORA92 British Cup Championship.
The 4 rounds were amazing and ran like clockwork! We are down but not out! And will be back in 2026.
Thank you to Thornbury MX for a top race series and to Coach Robb and NORA CRS for their support as always.
