GasGas back on podium with James Dabill
GAS GAS GETS BACK ONTO THE PODIUM WITH A SECOND PLACE FROM JAMES DABILL IN THE JAPANESE GP
The British rider from the Gas Gas Trial Factory Team gets the brand back on to the podium in the maximum category of trial with a second place in TrialGP in Motegi. Gael Chatagnoputs the cherry on the icing in this second GP of the season with a victory in Trial2 on Saturday. Two encouraging results pushing the team to ever-greater heights for the next event in the World Championship in Andorra.
James Dabill gets an important second place for Gas Gason the first day of the Japanese GP and brings the brand back to the top position in TrialGP. “I’ve equalled the best result of my career, so I’m very, very happy”, the British rider confessed euphorically after giving everything he had on the opening day of this the second GP of the season held in the woodland surrounding the Motegi racetrack in Japan.
Dabill, who on Friday had already won the classificatory round left on the last turn on Saturday, a privileged position letting him study his rivals mistakes before entering the zones himself.The previous nights’ rain left the ground ready for Dabill, one of the world’s greatest specialists in muddy conditions with little grip. “Starting after everybody else was a great help and I took advantage of this, especially on the first lap. We were very close towards the end but we did well enough on the first lap.”highlighted the British rider on his return to the podium in the maximum category of trial.
Dabillclimbs to 6th position in TrialGP, only5 points from 3rd place
The next day, with much drier ground, the TrialGP frontrunners’ points got closer and Dabill, despite finishing only six marks from the third position, was unable to repeat his podium position from the previous day. The Gas Gas rider finished seventh, a position, which when added to Saturday’s podium, gave encouragement to the British rider and all his team for the next events in a Trial World Championship that has only just begun. The rider from Yorkshirehas jumped from eighth place inCamprodonto sixth place after Motegi, and only five points from the third position.
Dabill’s second positionon rival terrain means an early success in one of the objectives set by Gas Gasat the beginning of the season: to be in the TrialGP podium positions. This represents a great motivation for the whole team to keep on fighting and to really go for it in the up-coming events in the World Championship.
The British rider led theGas Gas Trial Factory Team on the two days of the Japanese GP, which had a good and a bad side for Arnau Farré, as the rider with the RFME team on the one hand had a ninth place on Saturday and on the other an eleventh place on Sunday. The results for Franzi Kadlec and Matteo Grattarola were rather more regular. The young German rider finished the weekend with tenth and eighth places while the Italian rider finished the Japanese GP in positions which were unusually low for him, fifteenth on both days.
The young rider, Jack Price, who is training in the maximum category this year after winning the World Trial2 Championship in 2016, finished behind the Italian on the first day and improved on Sunday, his 20th birthday, with a ninth position,elbowing himself into the highly competitive ‘top ten’ of Trial GP. Meanwhile the rider from the MRW Gas Gasteam, Oriol Noguera, repeated his seventeenth position.
Victory for Gael Chatagno on the first day of Trial2
In Trial2, Gael Chatagno rounded off a magnificent Saturday for the Gas Gas Trial Factory Team winning a victory in the second to top category of the World Championship, the Junior Class. The French rider took advantage of the mud and slippery conditions of the ground to get his first win in Gas Gas colours.
The following day the young French rider was showing the strain after the first day and finished seventh. There was a combination of results for the brothers Jack and Dan Peace in the Japanese GP. The youngest of the family, Jack, got a seventh place on Saturday and a tenth on Sunday. His brother, Dan finished tenth on the first day and got really close to the podium on the final day with a fourth place only two marks from the third position.
Just the same as in the Spanish GP held in Camprodóntwo weeks ago, the Japanese GP also had a new face in Trial2.This time it was Shina Fujiwara. The young rider from Gas Gas Japan took advantage of the home ground GP to take part in the World Championship as a ‘wild card’, coming twenty-second on Saturday and making an improvement and getting an eighteenth position on Sunday.
Fabiet Poirot, the most consistent in Trial125
In the quarter litre class, the French rider Fabien Poirot, also with Gas Gas, was the most consistent rider, taking fourth and fifth places in Japan. The new arrival at Gas Gas in Trial125, the German rider Jarmo Robrahn, got two sixth positions, accompanied in the same category by the Japanese rider Takimi Inomae, fourteenth on both days in his home-ground GP.
After the second event of the World Championship, theGas Gas Trial Factory Team is coming back to Europe to prepare for the GP of Andorra taking place 17th and 18th June in SantJulià de Lòria.
Day 1 – Trial GP
1. T. Bou 48
2. J. Dabill (Gas Gas) 72
3. T. Fujinami 74
9. A. Farré (Gas Gas) 103
10. F. Kadlec (Gas Gas) 103
15. M. Grattarola (Gas Gas) 109
16. J. Price (Gas Gas) 111
17. O. Noguera (Gas Gas) 111
Day 2 – Trial GP
1. T. Bou 22
2. A. Raga 23
3. A. Cabestany 30
7. J. Dabill (Gas Gas) 36
8. F. Kadlec (Gas Gas) 54
9. J. Price (Gas Gas) 55
15. M. Grattarola (Gas Gas) 69
17. O. Noguera (Gas Gas) 73
21. A. Farré (Gas Gas) 89
Day 1 – Trial2
1. G. Chatagno (Gas Gas) 45
2. F. Moret 50
3. I. Roberts 52
7. J. Peace (Gas Gas) 61
8. H. Pedersen (Gas Gas) 68
10. D. Peace (Gas Gas) 73
21. S. Fujiwara (Gas Gas) 102
Day 2 – Trial2
1. Roberts 10
2. F. Moret 11
3. M. Riba 14
4. D. Peace (Gas Gas) 16
7. G. Chatagno (Gas Gas) 21
10. J. Peace (Gas Gas) 24
14. H. Pedersen (Gas Gas) 30
17. S. Fujiwara (Gas Gas) 42
Day1 – Trial125
1. B. Green 53
2. L. Gandola 60
3. E. Miquel 69
4. F. Poirot (Gas Gas) 79
6. J. Robrahn (Gas Gas) 89
14. T. Inomae (Gas Gas) 141
Day 2 – Trial125
1. L. Gandola 18
2. B. Green 21
3. E. Miquel 27
5. F. Poirot (Gas Gas) 31
6. J. Robrahn (Gas Gas) 33
14. T. Inomae (Gas Gas) 128
TRIALGP – Clasificación provisional
Puntos
1. T. Bou 60
2. A. Raga 45
3. J. Fajardo 39
4. A. Cabestany 38
5. T. Fujinami 37
6. J. Dabill (Gas Gas) 34
7. J. Busto 29
8. J. Casales 19
9. F. Kadlec (Gas Gas) 18
10. M. Gelabert 12
TRIAL2 – Clasificación provisional
Puntos
1. I. Roberts 52
2. F. Moret 47
3. G. Chatagno (Gas Gas) 37
4. G. Marcel·lí 37
5. L. Petrella 31
6. D. Peace (Gas Gas) 30
7. T. Martyn 27
8. M. Riba 25
9. J. Peace (Gas Gas) 25
10. T. Ogawa 18
TRIAL125 – Clasificación provisional
Puntos
1. L. Gandola 57
2. B. Green 54
3. E. Miquel 40
4. K. Touly 37
5. F. Poirot (Gas Gas) 33
6. J. Vold Gundvalsen 29
7. J. Robrahn (Gas Gas) 28
8. C. Rabino 19
9. C. Hogan 16
10. S. Yamahazaki 15
11. H. Dufrese (Gas Gas) 15