Last weekend Liam Everts was on the starting list for the third and fourth race of the Swedish championship. Both races held at the iconic Uddevalla track! The young KTM rider started his weekend with a sixth place in the timed qualifying sessions. But this more than decent qualifying result did not manifest itself into a great start in the first heat. Quite the opposite happened. Just a few meters over the starting gate Liam touched a fellow competitor and lost all his momentum, and started mid pack.
After some smart moves Liam found himself already in eleventh position after one lap. In the following laps he kept digging and made good progression towards the front. Liam races with flair, confidence and good lap times towards a well-deserved fourth place.
For the second heat, the track got transformed into one big mud pile. In this kind of conditions the start is crucial, but Liam took a great start and came through the first corner around fifth position. After a few laps Liamski took the third place firmly in hand, but being one of the riders who excels in these conditions he kept pushing. At the end of the race, Liam listed lap times that where faster than anyone on the track. Gaining sometimes more then 5 second a lap on the rider in second position, gave the youngster wings. He closed the gap and with only three laps to go complete a successful pass for the second place! He would keep this place till the finish. This second place combined with the fourth place from heat one, resulted in a well-earned third place overall.
In second day of the weekend, Liam clocked the fasted time in his group! This gave him a great starting position. After a decent start the Foodmaker supported rider run into troubles with Jed Beaton, resulting in falling back to the last place. Yet again Liam shows his growing maturity, keeping his riding clean and fast. Halfway the race he finds himself already in twelfth position. But Liam dug a little deeper resulting in him finishing in a hard fought seventh place!
When the starting gate fell for the second heat on Sunday, Liam took a great start bringing him through the first corners in fifth. This great start resulted in him being in the middle of an interesting battle for fourth and fifth. A battle he seemed to be winning, taking a nice lead on the fifth place. But in the second part of the race, the come-from-last-to seventh maneuver in the first heat took its toll. Liam slowed down a bit, but he knows to hang on his fourth place. The seventh place from the first heat and the fourth place from the second heat resulted in a fifth overall place overall.
Besides this news from the Swedish championship, we’ve also extra-sportive news. Everyone who saw the Belgian TV-show the ‘Container Cup’ knew that Liam only needed to succeed two exams to be graduated! Now we can announce that he succeeded and that received his diploma TSO Sport, and this just being 16 year old!
Picture: Dan Gustafsson - getmedia.se
