On The Pegs October 2019 -Volume 4 - Issue 10 | Page 105

On The Pegs
Vol. 4 Issue 10 - October 2019
105
Toni Bou finished off a perfect season by claiming
his seventh win in seven rounds at the final round of
the 2019 FIM Trial World Championship in La Nucia,
Spain, giving the Repsol Honda rider a 13th-straight
title.
Conditions just north of Benidorm on the
Mediterranean coast were dry and dusty and Bou,
as expected, looked completely at home. Following
his dominance of Saturday’s Qualification session he
had the advantage of starting last and he converted
this into a convincing victory, despite incurring an
additional eight time penalties.
The sections – a mixture of man-made and natural
obstacles – were super-tough and Bou collected
three maximums on his opening lap but at the
halfway stage he still led on a total of 17 with his
compatriot Adam Raga (TRRS) next best on 24. Then,
as we’ve seen so many times before, when the going
gets tough then Bou gets going and his lap-two total
of just 11 saw him run out a convincing winner with
an eventual victorious margin of seven over Raga
who picked up four marks on time.
“Having a perfect season and winning all races has
been spectacular,” said Bou. “After exceeding 100
wins, this was the challenge that I was lacking and I
am very happy to have achieved it. In addition, I am
also very happy to be able to tie with Jordi Tarrés on
14th consecutive victories. We always want more, so
we hope to start next season continuing this good
spell. Today’s trial was tough, the sections were very
slippery and we had very little time, so we made a lot
of mistakes. Luckily, everyone made mistakes but our
opponents picked up more marks. I am very happy to
be able to finish the season this way. Thank you very
much to the whole team for making it possible.”
Veteran Japanese rider Takahisa Fujinami (Repsol
Honda) secured his fifth podium finish of the year –