Sarah Humphries
- Jul 17
- 4 min read

Race Report - Tom Dickie Trophy Meeting at Melville MCC

This was a non Championship round at East Fortune Racing Circuit on my Ninja 300 but there were still Open and Club points up for grabs.

With the classes being smaller we were running combined classes (split grid) to make for some better battles so I was in with:

Junior Twin Restricted
Junior Twin Unrestricted
Classics
Junior Post Classics

There was a mixture of bikes across these classes up to 600s.

Saturday

Format for the day was Warm Up, Qualifying, Race 1, Race 2.

As I hadn’t previously raced in the wet at East Fortune, I took it easy in the practice session to get a feel for the track and the handling of the bike.

Qualifying

Dad put a new wet tyre on for qualifying as the other one wasn’t in great condition. This definitely helped my lap times which dropped nearly 4 seconds from the practice session. The track was still damp and the rain started again just at the end of the session.

1:14.482 P5 on the grid out of 10

Race 1

10 laps

Started in P5, got a good start, improved my lap times again. As the track had started to dry up this kind of wrecked my new wet tyres, ooops.

Anyway, managed to hold my position to the line. Finished P1 in restricted class and P5 overall in junior twins out of 10

Best lap time 1:12.412

Race 2

10 laps

The rain had been back on, although it was almost off when the race started but the track was still very wet.

I started in P5 and got another good start.

I managed to get up to 4th and then Brooklyn pulled in with bike issues. I stayed 4th all the way to the finish.

Ritchie and Kian were having a great battle at the front.

Finished P1 in restricted class and P4 overall in junior twins out of 10

Best lap time 1:18.482

*Credit to Weir Bike Sports for the above photo

Sunday

Format was Warm Up, Feature Race, Race 1, Race 2

Vick Lang Feature Race

This was put together by Sammi and she totally pulled it off, so a massive shout out to her and all that she does for the club.

The format involved 8 teams of 4 which were selected based on different qualifying time brackets. This meant that everyone was in with a chance of being selected not just the fastest riders or fastest bikes.

I was part of Team 7 along with Callum Grigor, Howard Selby and Jason Horne.

The race was in the form of a relay with 4 laps per rider and the transponder needed swapped between bikes each time which we volunteered dad to do.

Callum pulled an epic lead at the start with an amazing lap time of 58.9 then it was Howard and then Jason who both did fantastic with average lap times of 1.05 and finally it was me. Although the team had done amazing and I had about a 13 second lead heading out, I knew it would be a struggle as I was on my restricted 300 up against various other bikes.

Every lap I was being closed in on and on the final lap Team 5 got by me on a 600 down the straight. I tried to get him back into the corner but unfortunately I couldn’t and crossed the line in 2nd place.

I was about 0.5 seconds behind so I was a bit disappointed and thinking I’d let my team down until Callum ran up to tell me the other team got a 5 second penalty for keeping the bike in gear at the holding bay which in turn meant we won! Amazing!

Such a great experience and looking forward to the same again next year.

Thanks to Sandra Lang for putting up a prize fund. Was a great wee bonus

Race 1 & 2

10 laps each race

It was much better weather on Sunday so the track was dry. In both races, I started started P5 and finished P1 in the restricted class and P4 overall in Junior Twins with my best lap time in Race 1 being 1:12.443 and Race 2 being 1:11.270

Was great to see Zoe Paterson back on the bike after injury at the last Knockhill round.

Well done to Jack Dunabie on his wins on the Metrakit 125 and to Kian McDonald and Ritchie O’Neill on their great racing and battles throughout the weekend on the 300s. Also great to see my pal Darren Cox making his debut on the Aprillia125 after passing his assessment on Saturday.

Thanks to everyone from Melville Motorcycle Club and East Fortune Racing Circuit for the smooth running and a great weekend!