New winners, new podium faces and every race proving too close to call – thus proving to be a bloody great season of hard endure.
After a month off, we’re jumping back into the deep end of things with two races in September.
This coming weekend, we’ve got the Red Bull 111 Megawatt and then the Red Bull Sea to Sky to sign it off.
In 2016, Megawatt delivered an absolute banzai of a battle and so we’re hoping for more of the same in the gigantic Polish coal mine on Sunday.
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Raised difficulty, the course was a hard enduro sand feast we’d not really seen before. The soft sandy maze of climbs and trails tightened up the pack as the front runners continually sized each other up lap after lap.
At the checkered flag it was Jonny Walker who won by a whisker. Two seconds was the winning margin. Following his hand injury at Romaniacs, last year Walker entered Megawatt following a summer of injury and in a sense he’s doing the same this year.
But the Polish coal mine seems to serve him well having carded two wins from three starts, so don’t rule out a potential hat trick in 2017. He’ll have his work cut out though, that’s for sure. And none more so than Mario Roman.
Just two seconds behind him last year, it was Roman who placed for the runner up result, so you can bet your last buck he’s out to rectify that this time around.
Sherco are looking hot for victory with Wade Young ready to back Roman up.
Young — third in 2016 — returns to Megawatt off the back of his Romaniacs injury, but we believe he’s good to go.
In difference to the age card, Graham Jarvis likes to play his sand riding skills down, but G-Daddy’s got form in Poland.
Jarvis finished just 28 seconds shy of Walker, second in 2015 and leading his fair portion of the race in 2016.
With the Red Bull 111 Megawatt the only winner’s trophy not in his cabinet, don’t expect him to sit back and not show his hand.
The Red Bull Megawatt seems to be Alfredo Gomez’ nemesis. The Spaniard has yet to really figure the place out.
Gomez has quite the gap to close, finishing 18 minutes behind the top four for seventh. His win at Erzberg will certainly help in doing that, so it’s going to be interesting to see how he steps things up in Poland.
Manuel Lettenbichler is chomping at the bit for a hard enduro podium for the young guns. He came oh-so close at Romaniacs and having since spent time bashing out plenty of motocross laps, Poland might well be his race.
Billy Bolt arrives to Poland for the first time. It’s certainly going to be interesting to see what he makes of the venue, the Husqvarna rider could become the dark horse in the race for top honours.
Adding in the South African’s Travis Teadale, Scott Bouverie, Blake Gutzeit and Brett Swanepoel plus Paul Bolton and Lars Enockl means we’re in for a belter of a race on Sunday.
