Wil Ruprecht finished second overall in Enduro Junior 1 on the first day of racing at the EnduroGP of Portugal but fell off the pace on Day 2.
Day 1
The fight was absolutely fantastic between the dicing duo composed of Will RUPRECHT (AUS-Yamaha) and Andrea VERONA (ITA-TM). Leading all morning RUPRECHT made a small mistake in the 3rd Extreme Test. From then on, he could not do anything to fight off VERONA, with the Italian recovering strongly from bike issues at the start of the day.
After VERONA got the bike back to his liking, the Italian produced an incredible effort and managed to take over the lead at the end of the third lap! RUPRECHT held on to a handy 2nd place. 3rd overall on the day was Enric FRANCISCO (SPA-KTM) who finished ahead of Jack EDMONDSON (GBR-Sherco) 4th.
The J1 category podium therefore consisted of VERONA, RUPRECHT, and Theo ESPINASSE (FRA-Sherco).
And in J2, FRANCISCO took his second win in a row after a debut victory in Germany. EDMONDSON and Ruy BARBOSA (CHL-Husqvarna) rounded out the top three.
Day 2
By a tiny margin of just 9 seconds, Spain’s Enric FRANCISCO (KTM) conceded overall Junior victory against Andrea VERONA (ITA-TM). Ivan CERVANTES’ protege had a solid race all day, but a mistake in the last Enduro Test cost him time, and the ‘shark’ Andrea VERONA was ready to attack after stalking his rival closely all day. However, impressive FRANCISCO will carry a lot of confidence into his home GP next week in Santiago de Compostela (Spain).
4 out of 4 is the formidable statistic of Andrea VERONA. So far, the TM rider has been near faultless in the Junior category. After this exemplary start to the season, Andrea hopes to keep up this pace and continue his winning streak.
Everyone expected Will RUPRECHT (AUS-Yamaha) to be on at least one podium today, but instead it was Jack EDMONDSON (GBR-Sherco) who stepped up to snatch the 3rd step on the overall podium. The Sherco rider suffered with the heat this weekend, but he found enough energy and coupled this with his silky smooth riding style to finish this Portuguese weekend on a positive note.
Meanwhile, RUPRECHT finished 2 minutes 30 behind VERONA on this very tough Sunday. We’re sure he’ll be back for more next weekend.
The classification in J1 was VERONA ahead of Theo ESPINASSE (FRA-Sherco) and another Frenchman, Thomas DUBOST (KTM).
Ruprecht is third in the Junior 1 championship points standings.