Ulster Open Championship - Round 2, Downpatrick

The 2nd visit to Downpatrick in a week was due to a resheduled Ulster Open Championship round after the strangely post –poned round at Tandragee earlier in the month, but finally the riders got their chance to improve or continue their performance from round one and it was worth the wait!

Wayne Garret took advantage of Stuart Edmunds 2nd moto problems at Downpatrick to move into the lead of the Ulster Championship by a slender 5 points, but it was dubliner Edmonds who was on top form and won 2 motos on the day. Only for a rock to apparently bend the gear lever on the first lap of the 2nd race it may have been 3 but, by the time Stuart pulled over and fixed the offending item he was half a lap down on his next closest challenger in last place but far from giving up he battled through to 13th position and kept his championship hopes very much alive by going out and winning an important 3rd moto. Garret could only muster a 3rd place in the final moto behind a flying Gary Gibson so TM mounted Edmunds got back 5 of the points he had lost in race two. Clearly these two are going to battle hard for the rest of the series and its anyones guess as to who will come out on top.

It was nice to see Robert Hamilton riding at home again and after a great ride in the British Championship the Portavogie rider is getting faster every week 3rd overall was his reward for consistent riding if not always great starts on the 250f pioneer yamaha. 4th overall was Richard Bird who again proved his liking for the Downpatrick course and fought tooth and nail for every point in a bid to climb the championship table after a mediocre first round. Tommy merton had a mixed day after no points in the first moto he came out swinging in the 2md rce and got a close 2nd place behind Garret, he then rode his 250f KTM machine to a battling 4th in the final race after working his way through the field in the wheeltracks of Garret.

Special mention must go to David McCambley who looked set to maybe win the first moto but a mechanical problem on his KTM machine left him with a DNF and unable to start the next two races but after splitting from Moto One Suzuki McCambley has refound his speed of last season and maybe a win is not to far away.


1 33 Wayne Garrett 82 27 30 25
2 162 Stuart Edmunds 68 30 8 30
3 36 Robert Hamilton 67 25 21 21
4 57 Richard Bird 63 23 25 15
5 2 Thomas Merton 50 0 27 23
6 7 Gary Gibson 46 19 0 27
7 15 Philip Loughlin 45 11 17 17
8 18 Ross Brown 38 8 19 11
9 10 Stephen Kelly 36 21 7 8
10 12 Adam McKee 36 13 23 0

By: Jonathan McCready, Photos: Paul McCready