RUST magazine: RUST Tref Special

A Brief History
rust enduro
T
HE FIRST TREFLE Lozerien, or ‘Lozere Clover’,
took place in 1986, with the same basic format
we see today. Run over three days, the three
separate loops out of Mende formed a cloverleaf
shape, which gave the event its name.
The Moto Club Lozere intended the event to be both
ridden, and rideable, by professionals and amateurs
alike. As with the other ‘classic’ French enduros it
inspired (the Val de Lorraine, Cyrano Grappe etc), the
timing on the going is reasonably slack. Sure, you’ll
want to keep up a reasonably brisk pace in order to
give yourself a margin for error and enough time to
eat some cheese and catch some rays at each check,
but there are no ‘tight checks’. The idea is that you
enjoy the riding and your surroundings.
150 riders entered that first year, doubling the second
year, and growing to 500 for the third. The event is
massively over-subscribed, though numbers are
capped at a manageable 550.
Entries open in late January (look out for updates
on www.trefle-lozerien-amv.com and
www.facebook.com/TrefleLozerienAMV/) and the
event takes place in the last week in May or the first
week in June.
Many giants of the sport have entered, though to this
day only Frenchmen have won. Gilles Lalay was the
first, with Stephane Peterhansel winning the next five
in a row (and nine in total!). At the turn of the century
David Fretigne took six on the bounce, and Marc
Germain has claimed victory in five. This year,
Outsiders Yamaha’s Jamie McCanney was the closest
non-Frenchman to winning – after 57 minutes of
special test action he was a paltry six seconds behind
Jeremy Tarroux.
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