National Rally
Kegworth Control is staffed by past members and friends of the Leicester Phoenix Motorcycle Club, but we are keen to recruit more helpers who must be qualified to talk about motorcycles or the "old days" or sport or politics or real ale or folk music or jazz or ... patient enough to listen to it! We divi the duties into nominal five hour Watches as follows.
| Lark Watch | 11.30 am setup 12.00 midday open 4.30 pm | Ben Crossley Wishbone Dave Parry |
| Crow Watch | 4.00 pm 9.00 pm | Rob Winnett Dave Scattergood |
| Owl Watch | 8.30 pm 1.30 am | Bill Price Mary Grant |
| Bat Watch | 1.00 am 5.40 am close 6.00 am cleared | Wishbone Ben Crossley |
Lark Watch
Everything ran 2 hours earlier this year so I brought Peter along at 11 o'clock and made him buy me breakfast at the Harvester.
Problem 1 - Find a hi-viz jacket large enough to fit my expanded tummy. At least this one had an appropriate warning on the back.
It was a relaxed start to this year's event but things became more hectic as the riders came in from MIRA special tests, forming a jostling queue to get their cards stamped.
Problem 2 - Hire some heavies to keep Phil Freestone and Dave Smith in order.
Dave Parry joined us for the start of Lark Watch , arriving on his Suzuki.
Crow Watch
Bill Price arrived with his new caravan even before Crow Watch . Luckily there were not so many people taking their dogs for a shit so Bill could fit in next to us.
Problem 3 - Bring some Thousand-and-One to wash dog pooh out of Bill's Axminster.
Like Dave Parry, Dave Scattergood and Rob Winnett arrived on their motorcycles on good time to take up their duties.
Problem 4 - Issue marshals with carpet slippers for harmless tyre-kicking duties.
Owl Watch
Mary Grant joined brother Bill as summer light faded to twilight and darkness. Riders continued to arrive without pause and were offered a warm drink and Mary's cookies and pastries.
Problem 5 - Post a warning to save more of Mary's cookies for Bat Watch.
Daytime temperatures approached 30°C but evening gave cool respite for riders and marshals.
Problem 6 - Get a bigger visor-wash bucket that will double as a Jacuzzi.
Bat Watch
By the time the control baton was passed to Bat Watch it was cool enough to require coats. A serious accident between Ashbourne and Kegworth had closed the A50 so riders were needing to divert onto alternative roads as they made their way to final controls.
As the sun reappeared for an even warmer day, riders passing through our Kegworth control began to tail off, leaving plenty of uninterrupted talk time to put the world to rights.
Problem 7 - Persuade the Scottish and Welsh National Rallies to include Kegworth Control. (After all, the Tour de France goes through Sheffield!)
Riders
Column 1 is starters, others are half hour totals. Move your pointer over a column to see who came through at about that time.
There are photos of the riders coming through Kegworth in our Photo Gallery.
Bikes
This year there were 559 enties and these are the bikes they were riding.
Compare the percentages with last year.
Thanks
Thank you to all marshals for making this event easy to arrange and a pleasure to operate.
Thanks to Stacy Dennis and Krzysztof Osajda at Moto Services for permitting the use of their car park.
Thanks to all the riders passing through our control for remaining cheerful even when tired and needing to rearrange routes.
See you all next year!
I very much hope to visit your control again next year, hopefully a couple of hours earlier than I did this year so that I don't have to reschedule my route to salvage a Silver next time.
Thanks for the info re which junction to take for the A52 and Ashbourne.
I very much hope to visit your control again next year, hopefully a couple of hours earlier than I did this year so that I don't have to reschedule my route to salvage a Silver next time.
We have done slightly different routes each year, apart from this year which (apart from East Goscote) was exactly the same as last year. We did the same route as we were after special gold and we broke down at Whitchurch last year so only got daytime bronze.
I have been doing the rally since 2008 (I did do it twice around 20 years ago!) and each year the route has included Kegworth. In 2008 and 2009 Kegworth was near the end of our rally but since then it has been near the beginning, usually 4 or 5 controls in.
So yes, I think my motorcycle now knows its own way to Kegworth!
Please thank everyone at the control for their help - I had already been to seven other controls and yours was the first to have a bucket of soapy water to clean visors - very much appreciated!!