Australasian Safari 2011 – Day Two
Race Standings – Day Two
1st Todd Smith (Honda)
2nd Jacob Smith (Honda)
3rd Ben Grabham (KTM)
4th Shane Diener (Yamaha)
5th Matt Fish (KTM)
6th Cyril Despres (KTM)
7th Rod Faggotter (Yamaha)
8th Damien Grabham (Husberg)
9th David Schwarz (Husberg)
10th Ben Williams (Honda)
– Smith brothers continue to lead Australasian Safari
Leg 2 of the Australasian Safari was a short day for both riders and crews, with the Smith brothers being the first two bikes rolling out of Mt Magnet from 7.30am, and arriving in Sandstone shortly after midday. SS3 consisted of 196.96km before the Nyuing service, followed by 129.75km in SS4.
All GHR riders successfully cleared both selectives stages save for Stuart Bowen who had a stick spear through his boot in SS4. At the time of writing Bowen was undergoing treatment at Sandstone but he is intending to continue the race tomorrow.
SS3 was won by Jacob Smith with a time of 01:54:56, followed by Ben Grabham at 01:55.49 and Todd Smith at 01:56:37.
Todd Smith was just under a minute faster than his brother in SS4 with a stage time of 01:11:10 over Jacob’s 01:12:08.
Todd leads the Safari at 07:28:40, followed by Jacob at 07:31:22 and Ben Grabham at 07:32:28. Cyril Despres stands in sixth place at 07:43:11 total race time.
Jacob Smith: “Todd and I rode together for much of the way today and worked together. Over here you do have to read the terrain more than at Dakar and having someone to ride with is a huge help. At Dakar, if it’s a 45 degree corner, the arrow shows the corner as it really is, angle and everything. Here you have to work it out as you go and that’s what we are used to. There will be a 4 or 5 kilometre length of road that does change direction, quite often but it’s marked as straight. But it doesn’t mean there aren’t things waiting for you around the next bend.”
Todd Smith: “The terrain opened up a bit more today which suits me well. I struggled a bit in the morning just finding the track, but it came good in SS4. Early on there really wasn’t a well defined track, just a change in the colour of the grass at times – so definitely another day that was hard on the lead riders. I’d actually be happy to go out third tomorrow. Just spotting the odd roost mark helps define bumps and corners, making it so much easier to ride fast. That’s where riding with Jake was so good when we joined up. We raced each other most of the way for a great run with no mistakes.”
Vale Don Hoffmann: It’s with sadness that the GHR family announce the passing of Glenn Hoffmann’s father on the evening of 23 September 2011. Don had been ill for some time, but celebrated life right up to the end, surrounded by loved ones in hospital while he watched the footy on Friday night. When he learned how well Jacob and Todd had run in the prologue, his response was a resolute “stick it up ’em!” with a fist in the air. The Hoffmann family and team knew that Don – the man who first put Glenn on a motorcycle – remained GHR’s biggest supporter all the way to his last. Having played a huge part of the successes achieved over the years, he will be sorely missed but fondly remembered by all.
– Yamaha Report
Despite a long and challenging day in the West Australian outback, the Yamaha supported duo of Rod Faggotter and Shane Diener continue to fight on and find themselves well entrenched in the top 10 after day two was completed.
As day two of the 2011 Australian Safari wound its way from Mount Magnet to Sandstone, some 350kilometres of racing, it wasn’t without some drama and tension as the Yamaha team battled timing issues, crashes and injury but still sit in seventh and fourth respectively.
Shane Diener made his presence felt on day two climbing several spots to finish the day fourth on the road and within eight minutes of the overall motorcycle lead. But all wasn’t rosy for Diener as he was slapped with a time penalty before getting it reversed when a transport section was mistimed. Diener and a follow competitor were issued 30 minute penalties in the morning stage but that decision was over tuned when the error in timing was found.
He then motored to a third place finish in the afternoon session and now sits in an impressive fourth place and hoping to continue his climb up the leader board.
“I wasn’t overly concerned about the original time penalty as I knew I hadn’t done anything wrong. So I kept my mind on the job, stayed on the bike and kept trying to peg back the guys in front of me.”
“Fourth on day two means I have made a solid start to the event, but there is plenty of riding and racing still to come so myself and the crew have to keep focus all the way to the finish if we want to win,” Diener states.
Day two wasn’t without its drama for Rod Faggotter either. Faggotter crashed heavily in the morning ride, injuring his hand and taking a good hit to the head. But the tough Queenslander dusted himself off, picked up he is bike and soldiered on to finish the day and sit in seventh place.
“My hand doesn’t feel too good and I’m not exactly sure what I have done to it. But I finished the day and plan on racing tomorrow so I just have to put it out of my mind and keep on rolling,” Faggotter says.
“I’m not really sure how I even crashed. I know I ended up running off the trail and getting my hand stuck between my handlebars and Barkbusters so that’s what caused the pain. But I must have hit something to end up off the trail,” he ends.
Day three will see the riders go from Sandstone to Laverton. The course is well over 500kilometres making it the longest day in the saddle for the riders in the 2011 event. The Yamaha duo will be keep to put their day two troubles behind them and keeping their WR450Fs purring along smoothly.
