Big crash keeps Britain’s Anthony Ford-Dunn in 4th Position in the 2011 Spanish Supermoto championship

Britains expat racer,  Anthony Ford –Dunn had his hopes of elevating his final position in the 2011 Spanish Supermoto Championship thwarted by a heavy crash in the first of his two races at the Albaida circuit, Valencia.

The day had started under a dark cloud after news of the terrible accident suffered by Marco Simoncelli in the Malaysian MotoGP that would claim his life. There was an air of disbelief around the Supermoto Paddock as everyone came to terms with the loss of the likeable and popular Italian racer.

Anthony prepared himself for his qualifying practice session and set off at a fast pace around the spectacular Albaida circuit. With a large off-road section that included some big vertical drops and a massive 20 metre table top jump, before the riders swept back onto the fast tarmac race track, the Albaida circuit definitely sorted the men from the boys.

On the 6^th lap of qualifying Anthony’s engine broke and he had to retire from the session. The www.supermotoland.com team had to work fast in order to change the engine within 1 hour and 30 minutes before the first SM1 race. The new engine was installed in the nick of time and Anthony lined up in 5^th position on the grid for his first race.

When the start lights went out Anthony was soon in the thick of the action and fought his way up to 3rd place, but he was struggling with the position of his gear shift pedal on his new engine which made changing gear difficult. Midway through the race Anthony missed a gear as he approached the big tabletop jump and was launched over the handlebars as he landed. The resulting impact was enough to rule Anthony out of the rest of the day’s races, although he was fortunate not to sustain any broken bones. 

Without the opportunity to complete any of the days races Anthony had to be content with finishing 4^th overall in this year’s SM1 Spanish championship. ‘4th position is a little disappointing as I was 2nd in 2010, but I have had some bad luck this year that has prevented me from performing as well as I would have liked.’ said Anthony as he hobbled back from the circuit medical centre.

Anthony’s older Brother Mat Ford – Dunn also finished 4^th in his championship. Mat was racing in the SM road category that misses out the dirt section and races only on the tarmac race circuit. After qualifying on the front row in 3^rd position Mat was confident of a good result but a poor tyre selection meant that his rear tyre overheated and started to lose grip as the race went on. He slowly slipped back to finish in 6^th position and was lucky to finish at all after his rear tyre started to fall apart.

Both brothers will next be racing in the Catalan championships on the 6^th of November at the Alcarras circuit in Lleida.