Auckland’s Chris Birch continues to lead the Kiwi charge at the 2013 Red Bull Romaniacs hard enduro in Romania, while Te Awamutu’s Kevin Archer was the biggest mover on day one, rocketing into the lead in the Expert Single grade.

Birch, the 2013 New Zealand enduro champion, is sixth overall in the Pro Class – currently led by Britain’s Graham Jarvis, German Andreas Lettenbichler and Spain’s Alfredo Gomez – while fellow Kiwi Adrian Broughton moved up one spot from 28th (after the prologue) to 27th after day one.

In the Expert Single grade, almost all the New Zealand riders improved their respective positions after the prologue stage.

KTM ace Archer (pictured here) was on the charge, lifting himself from 40th after the prologue to now be leading the Expert Single grade.

Tokoroa’s Sean Clarke went from 43rd to third after day one, while Taranaki’s Dougy Herbert zoomed up from 28th to fifth.

Taupo’s Mark De Lautour remains 18th in the Expert Single grade, while Greg De Lautour moved up from 27th to 17th.

Other Kiwi improvers were Ray Lempriere (from 54th to 46th) and Mark Newton (from 60th to 27th), while Chris Hilton slipped back from 39th to 59th, David Lacey dropped back from 59th to 61st and Mark Auld slipped from 48th to 62nd.

In the Expert Team category, Duncan and Tony McLaren are running 7th overall after day one (up from 12th after the prologue).

Over the past years, Offroad Day 1 of the Red Bull Romaniacs has been regarded as a “shock and awe” intro for the riders.

While the veterans expect it and prepare for the worst, it is the newcomers, who enter the first race day still nurturing sweet hopes that it will not be that bad.

Those hopes were in vain. The first ones to suffer where the riders of the Hobby class. When they arrived at an uphill one hour into the race, the Pro- and Expert-class riders were long gone. The hillclimb wasn’t even considered one of the extremes of the day by race-management, but when a bottle-neck developed and 150 riders got stuck in the forest, the track managers reacted immediately and left to resolve the situation.

Track director Klaus Sørensen: “It looked quite dramatic when we arrived, some riders were just sitting there hoping for a miracle, others were teaming up and some were looking for alternatives routes. I think we pulled up each of the 150 bikes single-handedly or rode the bikes up ourselves. I have never ridden so many different bikes in one day and I was amazed by the great spirit of these riders!”

The Expert- and Pro-class were facing their own challenges and were busy re-organizing their hierarchy. As expected after his cautious riding during prologue, Graham Jarvis went “all in” yesterday and completed “step two” on his plan to win the Red Bull Romaniacs for the fourth time.

Husaberg factory pilot Jarvis started fourth yesterday and finished with a 26 minute lead on Andreas Lettenbichler, who came in second. But even for Jarvis the day wasn’t without challenge. He was seen asking spectators for help and then being pulled up a hill, which is a truly rare sight. And one that became reality for Letti as well. He eventually realised that getting up the “bad shape” section would be close to impossible and much easier in tow of a few spectators. Letti delivered an exceptional performance on his first Offroad Day by starting as 9th and finishing 2nd, just before Alfredo Gomez, who was repeatedly seen applying pressure to him and who finished third.

The previous years have shown that it is very hard for newcomers to end up on the podium of the Red Bull Romaniacs – physical fitness, riding – and navigation-skills are not enough to dominate the race. Experience counts very much and it helps to have ridden the rallye before. Therefore it is even more impressive how Red Bull Romaniacs “rookie” Ben Hemingway continued his positive performance from yesterday and rode himself onto the fourth place on Offroad Day 1.

Britons Paul Bolton and Jonny Walker continued chasing each other like they did during the prologue and spent quite some time together out there in the morning. But both were also chased by bad luck: Walker ended up running out of gas and losing precious time, while Bolton involuntarily left his bike several times. Bolton: “I was not very lucky today – I made a few gut-decisions that always ended up sending me in the wrong direction and into a few crashes. But I loved some of the gnarly uphills and am looking forward to tomorrow!”

Bolton teamed up with New Zealand’s Chris Birch later in the day and they were seen helping each other pulling their bikes up “bad shape”. It is always impressive to see the fiercest competitors teaming up to get through the most demanding sections together, only to fight later for every inch to secure their own place on the podium.

© Photo by Andy McGechan, www.BikesportNZ.com