For the first round of any championship it is hard to estimate the likely turnout. With the first round being held at the popular Pontefract track, the change to Falcon motors for the Team race and  the 1/32^nd Falcon class now being open to all drivers, we hoped for a large attendance. It was therefore disappointing that only 21 drivers arrived for the individual class. However it was nice to see three first time BSL racers, Trevor and Stuart Tennant and Edward Spalek, from the Leicester club. Although a disappointing turnout it was a small improvement on last year when only 18 drivers attended.

1/32 Individual Heats

 For the individual class ten drivers chose to race in super production and eleven raced Falcon powered cars. Of the 11 Falcon racers only Ralph and Sandy Parker and Graham Thomas (all Oakland's members) were not eligible for novice Falcon. The first two heats were for those eligible for Falcon novice, the best score being the 24.92 laps recorded by Mike Ogden. Heat three was for those Falcons drivers who are not eligible for novice. Graham Thomas won the heat to set a new target of 25.50 laps.

None of the three drivers in the next heat, all of which were driving super production cars, could better this score. However Graeme Stephenson set a new target of 28.90 laps in heat 5 and not even the top four from last years overall championship, Paul Shepherd, Steve Sargent, Martin Ellis and Chris Thomas could better this score in heat six.

 The second round of heats saw several improvements with Ralph Parker 25.32 moving up to second place in Falcon, Martin Ellis 27.58 now 4th overall, Chas Keeling 27.93 moving to third overall and Paul Shepherd 28.96 taking the overall lead.

The last round of heats saw Graham Thomas 25.80 improve his overall Falcon lead and Mike Ogden 25.43 moving to second place in Falcon. In Super production Steve Sargent 27.81 took the last place in the A final away from Martin Ellis.

1/32nd Heat Results

Finals

The finals format meant that all drivers race together, regardless of class of car! First timer Edward Spalek won beating juniors Thomas Hornsby and Matthew Siddall in the F final.  The E Final was won by Mark Croston from Stephen Siddall and the returning David Sargent.

Sandy Parker beat both of the Tennants to take the D final. Stuart was having problems with a bent Super production car and I am sure that he will do better if he attends the next two rounds. The C final was contested by the top four Falcon runners. Graham Thomas won with Mike Ogden second (first in the Falcon Novice drivers), Ralph Parker third and Mickey Prout fourth. Having struggled through qualifying Chris Thomas then had gear problems in the warm up for the B final and had to change to his second car. Martin Ellis had just missed out on the A final and (as is often the case with Martin) seemed to loose interest in the B final. The result was a win for Chris with Rob Hesiltine second, Martin third and Andy Brown fourth. The A final was won convincingly by Paul Shepherd. Second place was fiercely contested by Graeme Stephenson who finally beat Steve Sargent by just 23 parts with Chas Keeling taking fourth place overall.

1/32nd Finals Results

A Final

L - R - Graeme Stephenson, Paul Shepherd, Chas Keeling, Steve Sargent.

1/24th Team Race

 The first race of the team event gave some justification to the move to Falcons as young Matthew Siddall set the fastest lap time of 6.4 seconds some 0.3 faster than the other three drivers. His over enthusiasm resulted in a few offs and only third place in the heat. However this was a much better performance than we had seen from Mathew last year when he had to struggle with the Super production powered cars. After the first runs for each team the leaders were SCD Roadhogs with 143.50 laps recorded by Paul Shepherd. This proved to be the best run of the day and was just 7 laps short of the best run last year. GT Rent a Wreck were nine laps behind in 2nd place but only four laps separated the next 5 teams. In the second round of heats Martin Ellis recorded 141.31 to move Area2 into second place but SCD were still 8 laps ahead. In the third round Laurel and Hardy moved into third place overall with a score of 138.78 by Ralph Parker. They had their last run before the other contenders and set a total of 539.11 laps. To better this SCD needed just 118 laps while Area2 required 129 laps. In the last heat Area2 driver Martin Ellis quickly realized that he could not make up 11 laps on SCD driver Chas Keeling, so it was just a case of Martin trying to record 129 laps on the unpopular red lane. At half way Martin was just about on target with just short of 65 laps. A better second half performance however secured second place by 3 laps. Local drivers Rob Hesiltine and Mickey Prout of GT Rent a Wreck finished 4^th less than a lap behind Laurel and Hardy. A couple of teams had car problems, Moraviams had gear trouble and Oaklands 1 had to change a slowing motor. Other than the Oaklands team the motors seemed to run ok and the racing is more even. Some of the more experienced drivers may find these cars to be a bit too easy to drive but the newcomers certainly got on better with them than they did the faster motors. All we need now is a few more newcomers to join in with the series and the change will be even more justified.

Team Race Results

Overall Results

Altogether a great day's racing.   It was an excellent first round of the series, with friendly fun and fiercely competitive racing.

Surprisingly some of last year's regular racers did not attend.  Maybe as the season progresses the interest in the series will develop. A sincere thank you is offered to Chris Thomas for Race Control organisation, and to able assistants Ian Prout and Rob Heseltine.  More thanks go to Steve for seeding the heats and Glyn for track preparation.

Report by Graham T and Chas K

Paul Shepherd's and SCD Roadhogs winning cars!

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