The IHRO Continental Circus moved on to the historic road circuit at Chimay in Belgium on the 3rd weekend of July for the third of its events of 2009.

Although moved to the 4.5km short circuit following problems with the local council, the meeting was well attended and the paddock started filling up quite early in the week.

Free practice started for the 250/350 class on Friday afternoon and it was Luke Notton on his Seeley 7R who set the early pace some 4 seconds faster than Lea Gourlay and Nigel Palmer. However in the Saturday morning qualifying session, neither Notton nor Gourlay went out and as a result were relegated to the back of the grid for both races. Palmer lead the qualifying from Phill Sharp on Tony Dunnell’s Norton with Peter Branton on Bob Rowe’s Manx in third place. The closeness of the mid field riders in practice was a precursor of the actual races as riders took care on the drying track. Mick Nash de Villiers was the sole representative of the 250 class in the qualifying session.

The 500 open session was a Gourlay benefit, he lapped some 6 seconds faster than Notton who was once again guest riding Roger Winfield’s second Paton with Phill Sharp and Gary Thwaites close behind him. The qualifying session was very similar, except that Alan Oversby moved up into third place on the howling replica MV 3 cylinder with Sharp and Ton Groot very close behind. Again there were groups of riders who qualified closely together and again this was a good indicator of the races to come.

The 350 race on Saturday afternoon was one of the closest fought for many years, Gourlay and Notton fought for the lead for the entire race, the victory going to Notton by just 0.18 seconds after he foiled Gourlay’s last corner attack. Sharp was a distant third. Vagn Jensen on his Manx had a race long fight with James Walker on Denis Gaskin’s Aermacchi and just took the advantage to the line, Jos Sassen on his Ducati just took 14th place from Eberhard Laible on his Aermacchi by 0.35 seconds. Nash de Villiers won the 250 class after Bernie Chequer pulled out early after a start line problem.

The 500s had to wait until Sunday morning for their first race, they lined up at 11.20 with a fantastic front row, 2 Patons, an MV and a Manx with a further Manx and a pair of Seeley G50s right behind and then the rest of a packed grid totalling 40 machines. Gourlay was determined to show interloper Notton who was in charge, and proceeded to pull out 4 seconds a lap to win very comfortably. Behind him Thwaites, Oversby and Sharp fought for third place with Thwaites getting the advantage as the MV slowed a little on the last couple of laps. Jensen and Palmer had a good battle with Jensen winning, as the superior speed of the Manx overcame Palmer’s enthusiastic riding. Close battles were a feature of the race with Marc Michot and Peter Branton less than 0.1 second apart for 10th and 11th places and less than a second separated 12 to 16th places with Colin Sleigh just beating Alan Jackson, William Gougy, Herman Verboven and Reinhard Neumair.

The second 350 race was after lunch and with grid positions still being decided by the qualifying, Gourlay and Notton were again on the back row. This time Notton was even more determined and took a second off his previous best lap time to win easily from Gourlay, the real battle however was between Sassen, Den Tieter, Nash de Villiers and Laible who had an amazing race lasting the full 6 laps for 11th place, three abreast up the start line and with positions constantly changing, the scrap was one of the highlights of the day.

The final 500 race came to the line late in the afternoon and no one was taking bets against Gourlay repeating his previous domination of the race, and so it proved as he led at the finish by 17 seconds from Notton, Sharp was a distant third. Again there were battles all through the field, Verboven and Gougy renewing their previous joust for 11th place with Verboven again taking the honours. Michot beat Jackson by 0.1 second for 14th while John Jones just held off Neumair by the same margin for 16th. Alan Windsor, Jose Van Meurs and Max Hirthammer had a fantastic race for 23rd with the benefit going to Windsor.

The Paton Polo shirts were won by Gourlay for the 500 multi cylinder class, Gary Thwaites for the 500 single cylinder class, Notton for the 350 class and inevitably Nash de Villiers for the 250cc class. Nash de Villiers now has an unassailable lead in the 250cc Challenge.

The Classic Racer Endeavour award was presented to Bernie Chequer, this was for the effort he made to compete at Schleiz where he postponed urgent medical treatment to attend the meeting, then had major machine problems at the event, resulting in him having to rebuild his motor a number of times in order to get to the line, he also postponed the treatment yet again to attend Chimay. A worthy first winner of this magnificent trophy.

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