Opening day of A4DE sees Milner take early advantage
Defending champion fastest over Tasmanian local Phillips.
Image: John Hamilton (Mad Dog Images).
Daniel Milner’s quest for his fourth Outright title in succession got off to the perfect start with an impressive opening day at the 2015 Yamaha Australian Four Day Enduro in Wynyard, Tasmania, on Wednesday.
The CDR Yamaha rider led the 223 competitors taking part in the event to top both the outright and E2 class standings at the end of day one.
Milner circuited the six special tests in a time of 58m39.553s, three seconds ahead of local hope and KTM Enduro Racing Team rider Matthew Phillips (58m42.657s), who finished as the leader of the E3 class.
Fellow KTM stablemate Daniel Sanders (59m15.656s) finished almost 33 seconds adrift from Phillips in third place overall, while Tuesday’s fastest rider in the Prologue Chris Hollis (CDR Yamaha) finished in fourth with a 59m22.287a.
Active8 Yamaha’s Josh Green (59m44.234s) finished the day as the E1 class leader and rounded out the top five in the Outright standings.
2015 Australian Off-Road Championship winner Toby Price has left himself with a reasonable body of work to do to get back in contention with the lead group in after finishing the day over a minute and a half behind Milner, but has a track record that means he simply can’t be discounted over the next three days.
In the Veterans, Damian Smith took a commanding early lead in the classification to finish over three and a half minutes ahead of his nearest rival in Rowan Pumpa. Yamaha’s Kirk Hutton looked the goods to lead the class into day two before he unfortunately crashed out of contention when completing the final test.
In the Masters, David Fleming leads by just under two minutes from Derek Grundy, with Mark Peacock sitting a further five minutes back from Grundy in third.
The Women’s class was dominated again by Australia’s trio of International Six Days Enduro world champions, but this time it was Sherco Ballards Motorex Off-Road rider Jess Gardiner who came out on top.
Gardiner finished 10 seconds ahead of ISDE Women’s champion Tayla Jones (Yamaha Racing), while Jemma Wilson (Yamaha Racing) finished the day in third.
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