The inaugural Maxxis Ultra4 Europe series has seen Maxxis USA’s Levi Shirley crowned King of Europe, with Maxxis UK’s Jim Marsden of Team Gigglepin in second place. Read how the final round of the series, King of Portugal, went down…
Text: Neil Whitford, Maxxis Ultra4 Europe, Photos: Thom Kingston, Spidertrax
The quiet town of Vimioso, just minutes from the rural border between Spain and Portugal, was once again the setting and gracious host of King of Portugal, the fourth and final round in the Maxxis Ultra4 Europe 2014 Series.
Despite its remote location the town has some fantastic community resources including campsite, sports arena and gymnasium – all of which were put to good use by the organisers for the convenience of the 30 teams which descended on the town from all points of the compass.
From its inception just a year ago King of Portugal has established a reputation as a ‘must do’ event in the Ultra4 Europe calendar thanks to the remarkable terrain which poses a unique set of challenges to man and machine.
Not only were the teams gathered to establish the next ‘King of Portugal’ but also the title of Maxxis Ultra4 Europe Champions with the 4 round series which had started in Scotland back in May due to be decided on the outcome of this race.
At that series-opener things had looked bleak for Team Lucky Dog driver Levi Shirley from Dodge City, Kansas when new vehicle teething problems had resulted in a DNF while top UK driver Jim Marsden from Team Gigglepin had established an unparallelled lead at the event and claimed the early top place in the series points table.
Those fortunes were reversed at the following event, King of the Mountains in Italy, where Marsden was forced to retire during the prologue stage and Shirley clawed back the winner’s 100 series points to leave the pair tied with one win each. Meanwhile, other European teams were steadily building their points total with consistent finishes at both events including Nicolas Montador from French Team WSR, Belgium’s Walter Phillipo and, also from Belgium, Axel Burmann.
King of the Valleys in Wales was the third round of the series and saw the first glimpse of Shirley’s domination of the series with his second outright win. Marsden however chased hard all weekend to level the field and achieved a valuable second place leaving the pair just 1 point adrift in the series table while Montador continued to add to his leader’s total with a podium 3rd place finish.
So, back in Portugal, these series contenders gathered but it wasn’t going to be just them battling for the honours as a strong field of Iberian driver’s would be going all out for the event title including last year’s winner Emanuel Costa and closest rival Paulo Candeias, both racing Ultra4 vehicles prepared to the highest level and well suited to the terrain.
Following Registration and Technical Inspections, the race commenced late on Thursday afternoon with the Prologue section at a new venue – the local motocross track – to which more Ultra4 sized challenges had been added in the shape of metre-deep cross axles and ditches.
Although Shirley and Marsden needed to finish the event in one piece to be assured any possibility of taking the series crown they showed no signs of taking it easy around this 2 minute course, both giving crowd-pleasing performances with Shirley fully airborne over the hillside jump and Marsden barely backing off into the manmade obstacles and really putting his suspension through its paces. Also going for it across this arduous section was Jaap Betsema in his D&G FireAnt, determined to test the effects of a day’s shock tuning by series sponsor King Shocks. The only casualty of the prologue was Axel Burmann who suffered transmission failure on the course and could only look forward to the prospect of a long night sourcing and modifying parts if he was to continue his race the following day.
Thanks to a 6 second victory in the Prologue, Shirley was first off the line for the event proper on Friday afternoon, followed by Marsden then Costa and Candeias – just one minute start intervals separating them and two laps of a 25km course lay ahead of them, twisting and turning out through the rural landscape surrounding Vimioso amongst giant granite boulders and through spectacular river crossings. There was the option to return to the pits for any essential maintenance between the two laps but the clock would carry on ticking in this eventuality so there was no time to relax.
Shirley lead the pack literally from the start with two consistently fast laps – just 12 seconds apart – and began to extend his lead. Despite starting second things were clearly not going smoothly for Marsden and he lost his advantage by the end of the first lap and seemed to spend an eternity in the pits before he emerged to tackle the second lap. Candeias was the closest to Shirley’s lap times but still around 3 minutes adrift for each lap and a number of teams found the terrain simply too punishing for their vehicles and couldn’t make it to the completion of this second lap including Jaap Betsema, Walter Phillippo and young Bailey Cole, son of Ultra4 founder Dave Cole, who was competing in his second European event of the season.
If the two laps on Friday were to be the warm up then Saturday was to be the real test with four laps to complete over two sessions and the added challenge of new lines through some of the trickiest rock sections just to prevent any complacency – Oh! and the weather forecast gave a 50% chance of rain which had the potential to transform the ground conditions beyond all recognition.
Maintaining his pole position meant that Shirley started the day’s proceedings again and managed to shave a full two minutes over his previous best lap time but Costa’s vigour was also renewed and he was beginning to close the gap. Indeed by the end of the day he would actually finish the event in physical first place having taken the lead when Shirley pulled into the pits for an essential wheel change. Candeias too was not backing off and the gap between the top three teams was getting narrower all the time. Meanwhile French driver Sylvain Bessiere was steadily clocking up the laps, his lap times no threat to the leaders but determined to register a strong finish to boost his series points standing in the debut year for his Black Rigs team vehicle. Fellow Frenchman Nicolas Montador was forced to retire during the second run of the day with transmission issues which could not be repaired and would see him relying on his strong finishes in the first three races of the series and aware that each additional lap Shirley and Marsden completed would further erode his chance of becoming series champion.
If Shirley knew that all he had to do was finish the 6 laps of the event he didn’t show it and continued to apply pressure trading lap times with the two local champions who were determined not to give up the event title without a fight.
During the first of the afternoon laps Marsden was clearly suffering vehicle issues as was fellow Brit Rob Butler, although both started their final laps they soon returned to the finish line to take a DNF rather than risk further damage. It was now a waiting game to see which other drivers would join them on the sidelines alongside the leaders who had completed their days racing just as the forecast rain began to fall.
In common with many mainland European events, the social atmosphere at King of Portugal is one of the facets that makes it an unforgettable experience and the prizegiving dinner only serves to reinforce this. With all of the teams, media, sponsors and organizing team gathered together in the state of the art Vimioso gymnasium it is a sight to behold and demonstrates how far the Ultra4 Europe community has developed in such a short space of time.
After a hearty, freshly cooked dinner King of Portugal organizer Jose Santos took to the stage to kick off the presentations with thanks to the Mayor and community of Vimioso for their support and making the whole event possible.
Next came the special prizes – King Shocks once again offered a bonus cash prize of €500 for the fastest time through the designated ‘King Shock Zone’ which was presented to Offroad Armoury’s Rob Butler. A further €500 was on offer to the driver of the fastest Prologue lap courtesy of Gigglepin4x4 and this was presented to Levi Shirley for his 2:22 minute lap.
Then it was on to Ultra4 Racing’s Dave Cole to read the names of all of the event participants and announce the winners in each of the three classes.
In the Stock Class; Alexandre Leal, Luis Soares and Victor Martins took 3rd, 2nd and 1st respectively.
In the Modified Class; Nelson Sousa, Maurizio Cherubini and Simplicio Gonçalves took 3rd, 2nd and 1st respectively.
In the Unlimited Class 3rd place went to Emanuel Costa, in 2nd was Paulo Candeias and the overall winner was Levi Shirley earning him his third European title of the year as King of Portugal.
Then it was onto the all-important Maxxis Ultra4 Europe 2014 Series points – with the best 3 results from the 4 events to count it means that even a non-finish at one event would not eliminate a team from a chance at the title which was a blessing for most of the teams.
Team WSR’s Nicolas Montador took the 3rd place trophy having lead the series for most of the year, in 2nd was Team Gigglepin’s Jim Marsden with one win and one runner-up place to his credit, while in 1st place with a ‘perfect score’ of three possible wins out of four was Team Lucky Dog’s Levi Shirley – the inaugural Maxxis Ultra4 Europe Series champion.
More:
- Check out the Maxxis Trepador, as used by Levi Shirley and Jim Marsden
- Find your nearest Maxxis stockist
