Toni Bou (Montesa Cota 4RT) is the new leader of the Spanish Trial Championship after having achieved victory in the third round of the championship, held this Sunday. The rider from Montesa has solved with solvency a race that was generally not very selective and whose greatest difficulty was to recover the points lost due to errors.
Jeroni Fajardo took second place in the race and Albert Cabestany took the podium in La Rioja. Adam Raga missed out on the podium by just one point and made a statement against Albert Cabestany, whom he accused of not being able to finish second in the race:
Adam Raga: “I’m not satisfied at all, but not because the race didn’t go well, but because a very unclean manoeuvre by Albert Cabestany took a second place off the podium that I deserved. On the first lap I made some mistakes, but I was able to improve on the second lap and I got behind Bou. The truth is that we have been riding well, the bike worked perfectly and we were not far from Toni’s scores, but then Cabestany decided to use a trick that we have already seen him use on other occasions and he slipped into me at the entrance of an area to force me to penalize. It says very little about him because it’s a way of achieving in a bad way what he wouldn’t have been able to win on the track. This is trial, not a poker game and it’s all about doing well in the zones.”
Toni Bou: “It was a trial with a simple approach and in which it was essential to stay focused to avoid mistakes that would have been difficult to correct. We solved it satisfactorily and the victory put us at the top of the general classification. So the balance of the day is positive.”
Albert Cabestany (full page of his website www.albertcabestany.com): Well, today a friend says to me: “What have you done to Raga?” He had read the headline of his team’s press release which read: “CABESTANY MAKES RAGA COME DOWN FROM THE PODIUM IN THE SPANISH TRIAL CHAMPIONSHIP IN ARNEDILLO”, followed by the rider’s statement (just the one you see above)
HAHAHAHA. But what a laugh! And what a snout they have! Starting with the fact that I didn’t make Adam come off the podium, he was simply never on that podium, because if we look at the standings he was fourth in Arnedillo.
If we look at the full statement, it says that “he skipped (referring to me) the order of access to the areas maintained by the pilots and entered a section when it corresponded to Àdam”. As far as I know, there is no first-come, first-served regulation of the zones, but there is a departure time, and an arrival time. Then you have to manage that time to be on time and not incur a penalty. And that’s what I did when I came in right at the minute. Not a minute before, not a minute after…
Now I have to understand that wanting to get in on time is a trick. In zone 2, Mr. Adam decided to overtake Jeroni. Of course, the order they speak in the communiqué didn’t apply then, right? And you can see that this is a trick that I have used many times. In fact, I always try to do it, because unlike him, I’m a rider who always plays dirty and that’s how I get my results from what he says. Needless to say, the ironic tone with which I am speaking…
What happened in zone 6, which is where there was time control, is that we got there just out of time. I was constantly looking at the clock and looked at the area quickly, more than I would have liked and taking risks in it by not supervising how well I would have wanted the course. Then I looked at the clock and saw that I had 10 minutes left to start the penalty and I told Lluis over the intercom that I was going to whistle at the bike or I would give a penalty, because I had to do it twice before taking the time. Jeroni was about to enter, and I got on his wheel, waiting for him to finish so that I could do it myself to return as soon as possible to the entrance and repeat the same process and hope not to penalize. That’s what Adam came to. And he didn’t say anything. Normal, let’s go. But by the second pass in the area, it looks like he had realized he was running out of time. And he told me to let him in. I showed him my watch showing him that I didn’t have time, if I let him pass I would penalize him, and of course, if something I’m not, it’s STUPID, or at least that’s what I try. I had limited myself to managing my time correctly, obviously much fairer than I would have liked. He got angry and told me that this was not being done, that we had kept order in the area throughout the trial. Why didn’t he tell me on the first pass to zone 6, huh? Why did he pass in front of Jeroni in zone 2?
That was all that happened in zone 6. That and nothing more than that. Then I was in zone 7 hydrating and eating a little when Adam came in very angry and saying a lot of nonsense like he did in the statement. That I always did the same thing, that it was the only way I won trials, and various silly things. I would go so far as to say that there are few riders cleaner and fairer than me in trial. Without going any further, in the Ibiza trial, the previous round of the national trial, I arrived at the administrative verification and they told me that instead of starting first (remember that the starting order is with respect to the previous trial or if it is the first event, the result of the final year, in a group of four riders in reverse order. A mess, I know, but we have to have a starting order according to the rules, right? hahaha I mean. the normal thing is that I would start first, followed by Fajardo, Bou and Raga), I would start 6th! That’s cool! hahaha they had decided that since in TR-S we were 9 drivers, they would do the same but in groups of three. Right there I told them that this decision did not seem right to me, although it was undoubtedly terribly beneficial for me, and the first thing I did was to go and warn Jeroni, who was the most affected by this decision, so that he could go and find out about the issue, and solve it. Well, now this one comes along and dares to say that about me? But it will have a nose!! And on top of that, he tells me!!!!!! hahahaha that’s something to make me laugh!!! It’s a pity that his anniversary was a few days ago, otherwise I would have given him a watch so that he can better control the time in the trial and stop justifying his mistakes with cheap excuses of a bad payer! Trial, in case you haven’t heard yet, isn’t just about the feet in the zones; It’s a journey, a time, a starting order, conflicting ribbons and arrows and many other things that come into play. I think he’s been in this world for enough years to understand that. And if not, as they say, it’s never too late to learn something new…”
The Spanish Trial Championship will resume on October 23 with the fourth and penultimate scoring race, in Peñarroya-Pueblonuevo (Córdoba).
Download results Arnedillo (all categories)
Download Montesa Press Release
