Daniel Mettam European Junior Cup Thread

**Toast** · 29th March 2011, 08:27

Hey All!

I’m just posting to give you a bit of an update on Daniel Mettam’s foray in to the European Junior Cup, which is the World Superbike Championship’s new development class, where he will be up against other young racers from around the world.

Daniel and his father, Glenn, left the country early last week and arrived in Spain for a 2-day training course on the weekend just passed.

They’re now off to Holland where they will be basing themselves, and they’ll hit the first round on the 17th of April at Assen

I know that a lot of you have followed Daniel’s progress over the couple of years he has taken on road-racing, and the rate of improvement, especially in recent months has been pretty awesome. Glenn hopes to provide updates on the adventure via the website (http://www.danielmettam.co.nz), and I will try to keep this thread updated with news from there as well.

Daniel’s schedule is copied below (from his website), as is the most recent news article from his website regarding the European Junior Cup

News Articles
February 24th 2011 - Daniel Mettam off to European Junior Cup at World Superbikes

We are pleased to announce that Daniel will shortly be off to compete at the 6 rnd European Junior Cup Championship to be held as a support class to the 2011 World Superbike events at Assen, Monza, Aragona, Silverstone, Nurburgring & Magny Cours - Daniel will be competing with around 20 other 14-17 yrs olds from around the world & they will all be riding identical race prepared Kawasaki Ninja 250R's - New Zealand's Simon Crafer has been appointed the Junior Coach of the series which kicks off with a two day training camp at Guadix in Southern Spain on 26/27th March. The Championship will run in between the World Supersport race & race two of the World Superbikes on the Sunday of race week-end, after practise on the Friday & qualifying on the Saturday - Crowds will sometimes get up around the 100,000 mark & it will provide a great window of opportunity for the kids on this stage to show off their skills - The winner of the series is eligible for a 15,000 euro prize fund towards a seasons racing in the European Superstock 600 Championship for 2012 or a 10,000 Euro prize - See www.worldsbk.com for other news on the European Junior Cup, bike spec's etc. Daniel is looking forward to the championship & a lot of organisation is underway to make it all happen to enable him to perform - he particularly wants to thank his current sponsors & supporters being Jamie & Wes Rajek of Wolfpack Racing, Rick at Spill Response NZ, Grant at CTAS, Chris at Motomail, Miles Purchase, Mark Mullins, Forbes & Davies, Preferred Mtg's - Also huge thanks to Phil & Cheryl London & John Connor .

Month 2011 Date/s Event Round Location
Mar 26/27th EJC Training Camp Guadix, Spain
Apr 17th Holland Rnd 1 Assen
May 8th Italy Rnd 2 Monza
June 19th Spain Rnd 3 Aragon
Jul 31st England Rnd 4 Silverstone
Sep 4th Germany Rnd 5 Nurburgring
Oct 2nd France Rnd 6 Magny Cours

Go Daniel!!!!

**Biggles08** · 29th March 2011, 08:39

Originally Posted by Toast

Hey All!

I’m just posting to give you a bit of an update on Daniel Mettam’s foray in to the European Junior Cup, which is the World Superbike Championship’s new development class, where he will be up against other young racers from around the world.

Daniel and his father, Glenn, left the country early last week and arrived in Spain for a 2-day training course on the weekend just passed.

They’re now off to Holland where they will be basing themselves, and they’ll hit the first round on the 17th of April at Assen

I know that a lot of you have followed Daniel’s progress over the couple of years he has taken on road-racing, and the rate of improvement, especially in recent months has been pretty awesome. Glenn hopes to provide updates on the adventure via the website (http://www.danielmettam.co.nz), and I will try to keep this thread updated with news from there as well.

Daniel’s schedule is copied below (from his website), as is the most recent news article from his website regarding the European Junior Cup

News Articles
February 24th 2011 - Daniel Mettam off to European Junior Cup at World Superbikes

We are pleased to announce that Daniel will shortly be off to compete at the 6 rnd European Junior Cup Championship to be held as a support class to the 2011 World Superbike events at Assen, Monza, Aragona, Silverstone, Nurburgring & Magny Cours - Daniel will be competing with around 20 other 14-17 yrs olds from around the world & they will all be riding identical race prepared Kawasaki Ninja 250R's - New Zealand's Simon Crafer has been appointed the Junior Coach of the series which kicks off with a two day training camp at Guadix in Southern Spain on 26/27th March. The Championship will run in between the World Supersport race & race two of the World Superbikes on the Sunday of race week-end, after practise on the Friday & qualifying on the Saturday - Crowds will sometimes get up around the 100,000 mark & it will provide a great window of opportunity for the kids on this stage to show off their skills - The winner of the series is eligible for a 15,000 euro prize fund towards a seasons racing in the European Superstock 600 Championship for 2012 or a 10,000 Euro prize - See www.worldsbk.com for other news on the European Junior Cup, bike spec's etc. Daniel is looking forward to the championship & a lot of organisation is underway to make it all happen to enable him to perform - he particularly wants to thank his current sponsors & supporters being Jamie & Wes Rajek of Wolfpack Racing, Rick at Spill Response NZ, Grant at CTAS, Chris at Motomail, Miles Purchase, Mark Mullins, Forbes & Davies, Preferred Mtg's - Also huge thanks to Phil & Cheryl London & John Connor .

Month 2011 Date/s Event Round Location
Mar 26/27th EJC Training Camp Guadix, Spain
Apr 17th Holland Rnd 1 Assen
May 8th Italy Rnd 2 Monza
June 19th Spain Rnd 3 Aragon
Jul 31st England Rnd 4 Silverstone
Sep 4th Germany Rnd 5 Nurburgring
Oct 2nd France Rnd 6 Magny Cours

Go Daniel!!!!

Good work Phil...and go hard Daniel!!! Good to see he's moved up to a real bike brand at last ;-) hehe

**CHOPPA** · 29th March 2011, 11:12

Livin the dream!! Good onya guys!!

Cant wait till Nixon can start riding.....

**gixerracer** · 29th March 2011, 17:14

Originally Posted by CHOPPA

Livin the dream!! Good onya guys!!

Cant wait till Nixon can start riding.....

Just adopt me Chop and pay for me to go overseas and you can lie the dream via me

**CHOPPA** · 29th March 2011, 21:11

Originally Posted by gixerracer

Just adopt me Chop and pay for me to go overseas and you can lie the dream via me

If only they had a world veteran superbike class! Id even qualify in a few months....

**gixerracer** · 30th March 2011, 05:48

Originally Posted by CHOPPA

If only they had a world veteran superbike class! Id even qualify in a few months....

Are you calling me old punk?
Thats it I was going to take it easy on you this weekend but not now

**codgyoleracer** · 30th March 2011, 09:13

Originally Posted by gixerracer

Are you calling me old punk?
Thats it I was going to take it easy on you this weekend but not now

Youve definatly got the pitlane practice/race won hands down Craig...... Its just the other bit between pit exit & entry that you need to go and do the business on.

**Toast** · 19th April 2011, 18:24

Got this from Daniel's Father this morning...made my day quite frankly!!

Also got some photos of Dan parking the bike up in 2nd place getter's spot and on the podium. I tried to upload them but can't seem to do so from work. There are a few here on Dan's Facebook page, I think, so if you could help with uploading some from there it would be much appreciated.

The report:

Hello All
Just a quick update as it is really late over here -
Well we have just finished the first round of this six rnd championship at Assen (held as support class to World Superbikes for 14-17 yr olds) & Daniel has exceeded our expectations (although not his) & finished 2nd in race 1 of this Championship - He rode a real sensible race over 10 laps (4.5km's per lap) around a circuit that he had only ever seen before on telly & with 30 mins practise on Friday & 30 mins qualifying on Saturday (where he qualified on front row in 4th spot) - In the race he set the 2nd fastest time & was only pipped for the fasted lap by 0.015 of a second - The fastest lap was set by a spanish kid (who then crashed out of the race) - Daniel had a near thing in the race where the Australian Matt Davies crashed right in front of him halfway through the race & the bike spun around right in front of Daniel & he just swerved to avoid the bike scrapping Matt's handlebar up underside of the bike & Daniels foot smashed Matt's screen into pieces - it was a good dodge - Daniel & the German (who eventually won the race & had raced at Assen several times before) then carried on for a good battle for next 2-3 laps before the German pulled out a slight advantage on lap 7 so Daniel then decided to bring it home & finish the race intact (& get some good championship points from rnd 1) with over a 30 sec advantage to 3rd place - At race end we were all so happy for him & to see him bring the bike into pit lane where 1st, 2nd & 3rd place come into (same spots where WSB place getters arrive) & then see them up on the WSB podium for presentations etc was well you can all imagine - Has been a long time since anyone from NZ got anywhere near there -
He was so proud & there was a few kiwis there to enjoy it with him including his main sponsors Phil & Cheryl who had flown out from NZ especially to see the race - As always there are a number of people that have directly & indirectly helped Daniel out to get to this point & as always you are all appreciated so much - It is only one round but we'll remember this moment for a very long time & now start to work on the next round - The championship is really well run, good access to everything we need - The European Cup organisers have bought their own chef for all meals etc - All very professionally done - We were amazed at all the transporters & motorhomes -

Till next time - Take Care

Glenn & Daniel

**Kiwi Graham:Me** · 19th April 2011, 18:31

The boy done good eh!
Really stoked for him, I'm surprised Glenn could see him up there on the podium. Had it been my boy there would have been tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat.
So proud of his achievments, well don Daniel.

**ajturbo** · 19th April 2011, 19:01

wow.. that is soooo great news.. especially the bit where he made the call to settle for second... that must have been hard...

**ac3_snow** · 19th April 2011, 19:29

wahoo thats awesome!! would be great to see the photo's too.

**Mumbles** · 24th April 2011, 07:47

here is a link about the race and has some great pictures in it (on the right hand side of the article)
http://www.kawasaki-racingteam.eu/ro...?Id=B633E97116

And if you want to follow on FB you can follow the group http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=...13262925402440

Nice work on starting this Phil

**Toast** · 27th April 2011, 16:39

Also from Glenn:

“It is filmed at the track on all the big screen, tv's, monitors etc but prob won't be picked up in NZ - I'm going to set up the video to film it off the telly at next rnd *& we might get it put on his website”

Next race on 8th of May at Monza.

Some good pictures if you follow this link and click on the story (at the top) about the Assen result:

http://www.danielmettam.co.nz/news.aspx