Last Sunday was a beautiful sunny day with pleasant temperature up to 20° C! It was a perfect day for The Speedway Fan Club to start its first event of the year. There were race competitions in 6 different classes, which is typical for Club Speedway.

For the 125cc class, it was quite an exciting afternoon with 3 different heat winners. Buddy Prijs earned the most points and therefore was the winner of this class who scored 3 heat victories. Darrel de Vries who took action the first time in Belgium scored a heat win and moved into second place. Only 12-years-old but fast enough to win the third place was the young lady Michaela Krupickova Liberic from the Czech Republic, who won one heat.

The race for the sidecar class always guarantees excitement. The race started with 3 teams but the first heat went wrong right away. Just after a service with the dust spray the track was a little too slippery for the 3-wheelers and the teams of Akkerman Eefsting-and-Dijkema Krawinkel went right off at the second bend. This dramatically led to a direct disqualification for both teams and an easy victory for the father-son duo Dimitri Valentin and Martens which was a logical consequence. With 3 consecutive heat victories the team of Louis and Dennis Akkerman Eefsting proved that they were stronger than the rest. Even though they lost the last heat to Jan Dijkema and Geert Krawinkel, they still won convincingly the sidecar class. Dijkema-Krawinkel duo was second and the third was Martens-Martens.

In the international class, the four fastest guys were back, who delivered great race spectacle. Henry van der Steen was winner in this class by winning 3 heats. The second place went to Sjoerd Rozenberg who won a heat but was two times second. Mark Stiekema drove his boisterous style to third place. However, all credits went to Nick Lourens who won the last heat. He’s just not that good for his competitors and landed fourth.

The class where everyone had looked forward to was the national class with such talents as Wim Kennis and Bert Berckmans, who keeps getting faster everytime. Wim drove his 4 qualifying heats superbly thus he got the maximum 12 points and immediately qualified for the finals. Here he was joined by 3 other riders who scored 10 points each. The Dutch Anne Spaan and Randy Oldenziel were joined by the surprisingly quick little Frenchman, Benoit Lorenzon.

In the final round, all eyes were on Wim Kennis who started from the inside lane. Wim unfortunately chose the wrong lane so the other 3 drivers drove faster from the starting point. Wim tried his best and all what he could to pass Lorenzon to achieve the third place but it didn’t work. The victory was claimed by Oldenziel and Spaan was the second placer. Wim had clearly shown that he has the right stuff and could make very good starts. This competition has given Wim Kennis more experience and a good training for the next races in the Helzoldstadion! Wim's performance will be watched with more interests and expectations during the second Club Speedway on June 13 as well as his participation in the Golden Helmet on September 5, where he can compete with even more high-caliber foreign pilots.

The next Races will take place on the weekend of 12th and 13th of June. The training will be on Saturday from 10:00 to 18:00 and on Sunday from13:00, the 2nd Club Speedway of the season will take place. And of course, September 5 for the best race of the year “The Golden Helmet”, so watch for it!

The full results can be found on the website from The Speedway Fan Club: www.speedwayfanclub.be