2024 Italian Enduro: Round 8 Highlights – Freeman and Holcombe battle in Pistoia

A classic Italian Enduro and a classic Freeman versus Holcombe battle for the win at round eight in Pistoia sees the Beta rider win – video highlights and results.

The winning result might be the same as day one in Pistoia, but the story behind round eight of the 2024 Italian Assoluti Enduro Championship was a different one.

The story of day one in Pistoia was of a rock-steady Brad Freeman ahead of Andrea Verona, Steve Holcombe and Matteo Cavallo duking it out for the podium.

Video highlights and results from round 7 here: Italian Enduro: Rnd7 highlights – Freeman heats up title fight

Day two saw Freeman remain in formidable on tests which produced some incredibly tight times but his British rival Holcombe, getting to grips with the Honda CRF400RX he will race at the ISDE in two weeks, fighting back and pushing it right to the wire.

In the first Extreme Test, Holcombe managed to surpass his RedMoto teammate Samuele Bernardini but Freeman remained in the lead. Then in the first Enduro Test Holcombe snatched the lead from Freeman while Albin Norrbin also arrived in podium contention, moving into third.

Holcombe and Freeman were trading places at the top of the leaderboard, fighting for every tenth of a second during the day before, in the end, it was Freeman who emerged victorious by under two seconds from Holcombe. Norrbin followed in third and stole two additional points away from Andrea Verona, fifth on day two in Pistoia, in the title chase.

In the championship standings, after missing the opening two rounds through injury, Freeman has scored five from six maximums and now overtakes Verona overall. Brad sits on 115 points to Verona’s 112 with Holcombe four points back and with two points scoring days remaining at rounds nine and 10, October 26-27 in Sanremo.