Wild "n" Wooly

Callum Hughes dominates the Wild 'n' Woolly

By Team TMX on 2nd Jan 25

Beta-mounted current British Expert Enduro Champion Callum Hughes completely dominated the 96th running of the Northampton club's Wild ‘n’ Woolly charity scramble. He got the holeshot, led every lap and lapped the entire field of 42 riders including second-place man Scott Bates. He made it look easy, which we all know it isn’t.

The Wild 'n' Woolly is far from easy

With the loss of the traditional home of the event venue at Blisworth in Northamptonshire, and with its replacement venue now sadly also lost to all motorsport, the club looked for another track that would first have a car park dry enough to park a hopefully a large number of charity paying spectators and a track wet enough to provide those spectators with the Woolly-signature wet muddy bits. Luckily, the lovely people at the Polesworth MX Track came to the rescue with their course just outside Tamworth.

It must be said that when the riders and spectators looked at the motocross track after some practice laps everyone thought it wasn’t going to be the usual Woolly-style race but boy were they wrong for just after a couple of laps at race speed some of the small puddles turned into deep ruts and two sections, one over the back of the venue, and another hairpin bend at the bottom turned into bottomless muddy bogs and the Wild ‘n’ Woolly spirit was saved.

Dead on noon and with the spectator car park full, the hour-long race started. Hughes powered his Beta into the lead and just disappeared into the distance. But as the rest of the riders followed him around the track, they were already turning into the colour of mud, with obscured number plates and already throwing goggles away.

By the third lap, and with Hughes already starting to lap riders, the boggy hairpin was already choking up with struggling riders and the first bike was pulled under ropes with a burnt-out clutch. All that effort for two laps.

By the halfway stage, and with Hughes finding lines that no one else seemed to see or try, the battle for second place was on between Bates and Harry Bradley. For some laps, the pair swapped places as first one, then the other would get held up either in the boggy bits or by fallen riders. With about 20 minutes to go, Bradley managed to open up a gap on Bates.

A helping hand is always welcome

With just a couple of laps left in the race, Hughes lapped the whole field. Bradley had a comfortable second place, with a trip to the podium on the cards. But his machine cried enough, stopped, and turned his race to a DNF, handing second place to Bates.

And so, James Barnwell (KTM) finished third with James Paczynski (GASGAS) fourth. Trials rider Alex Wigg (GASGAS) finished a creditable fifth, two laps down on the winner.

As the hour ended, a very happy Hughes crossed the finish line for his first Wild ‘n’ Woolly win. “It was great to lead from start to finish, and I think I lapped the second place as well,” he said. “I didn’t have any problems and just stayed smooth and ran my own race. I will have to give it another go to defend my first place.”

It’s funny that Hughes was classed as a Junior rider, as this event was run under motocross rules. 34 riders were classified as finishers, only eight DNFs were recorded and the event raised a lot of money for charity.