Brilliant Bou defends unbeaten record at TrialGP of France

After passing the halfway mark last time out in Great Britain, the 2026 Hertz FIM Trial World Championship moves into the closing stages this coming weekend (29-30 August) with the TrialGP of France – round five of seven – at Cahors in the south-west of the country, just over one-hundred kilometres north of Toulouse.

• FIM Trial World Championship travels to France for round five• Toni Bou bids to extend his TrialGP win-streak at Cahors• Alex Canales and Harison Skelton defend slim leads in Trial2 and Trial3 Junior

The sole round this season contested over one day of points-scoring action, competitors in the TrialGP, Trial2 and Trial3 Junior classes can look forward to sections comprising huge rocks and steep, loose bankings in a quarry along with hazards plotted on the banks of a river where more massive boulders and testing climbs await. The last time the championship visited Cahors was in 2024 when Toni Bou (Montesa) clinched his eighteenth TrialGP title in a row and although the Spanish superstar – who is unbeaten so far this season – will not be able to secure an incredible twentieth-straight crown this weekend, a ninth consecutive victory will put the championship within his reach when the series travels to the Netherlands for round six in early-September.

With Bou holding a commanding ninety-point lead, the battle for second place between his compatriots Jaime Busto (Beta) and Gabriel Marcelli (Montesa) is reaching fever pitch with the twenty-eight-year-old 2025 silver medallist holding a slender one-point advantage ahead of the twenty-six-year-old bronze medallist from last season. The pair have shown themselves to be incredibly evenly matched this year, but neither rider can afford to rest on their laurels as evergreen Italian Matteo Grattarola (Beta) is just fifteen points behind as he attempts to secure a career-best ranking of third or above. With a twenty-nine point lead over fifth-placed Miquel Gelabert (Honda), the thirty-eight-year-old from Bellano on the shores of Lake Como sits a safe fourth, but the Spaniard – riding the ground-breaking RTL Electric machine – has impressed this season with his run of cool and consistent results helping him to out-score the British pairing of Jack Peace (Sherco) and class newcomer Harry Hemingway (Beta).

It is much, much closer in Trial2 where only fifteen points separate the top five and with five different overall winners from the eight days of competition staged so far, it is too close to call. Spain’s Alex Canales (Montesa) has led the class since the opening day of competition in Japan back in May with a string of impressive results, although last time out at Trac Mon Circuit Anglesey he suffered his worst finish of the season in eighth, allowing Britain’s Harry Turner (Sherco) to cut his advantage to just two points. A further two points off the pace, Spain’s Arnau Farré (Sherco) is still looking for a win this season, as is fourth-placed George Hemingway (Beta) who in his second season in the class is looking completely at home and, sitting just eleven points off the lead, remains very much in contention. Winner of day two at the TrialGP of Great Britain, Italian Francesco Titli (Montesa) completes the top five and the teenager could very well use Cahors as a springboard into the medal positions, but such is the depth in talent in this class the winner in France may come from lower down the points table with Britain’s former champion Billy Green (Scorpa) and France’s Benoit Bincaz (Electric Motion) – currently sixth and seventh – both with two victories to their names this season.

With three rounds down in the shorter Trial3 Junior championship campaign, France represents the penultimate round for the series’ youngest riders and it is Britain’s Harison Skelton (Scorpa) who holds a narrow two-point lead from Italian Fabio Mazzola. With third-placed Oriol Garcia Campano (Sherco) from Spain already fifty-two points behind Skelton it is shaping up to be a two-rider contest for the title. However, while only the leading pair have tasted victory this season there is a queue of talented riders – including Campano, Germany’s Marco Laure (Beta), Norwegian Patrick Bjørnland Larsen (Sherco) and Britain’s Max Dance (Scorpa) who have all scored at least one podium finish this season – focussed on the top step of the podium. The action from Cahors begins on Saturday (29 August) with the Super Test for all classes scheduled for 17:30 (local time) before the opening race of the weekend gets under way the following day at 10:00 (local time).