Oaklands individual

 Once again there were only 6 super production runners and these were put into two groups of three. The other 20 Falcon runners were put into the first 5 groups.

 Heat 1 was a win for Andrew Hogg with 26.88 laps. Only Matthew Siddall improved on this in heat 2 recording 27.94 laps. In heat 3 Dave Homer used his track knowledge to win with 31.17 laps which was not improved on in heat 4. In heat 5 Graham Thomas, who was top Falcon runner last year equaled his previous years best run on 34.51 laps with Sandy Parker moving into second overall on 31.92. The first of the super production races was won by Charlie Gooding with his 33.92 moving him into second overall. In the last heat of the first round Paul set the new target with 36.97 laps with Chris Thomas second on 35.50 laps.

          In the first of the second round of heats Andrew won again and was 8 parts of a lap better than in his first run. Matthew Siddall also won for the second time in the next race and improved by nearly three laps to score a very impressive 30.47 laps. In the next race on Paul Bucknell with 27.93 laps improved on his first round score. In the next race Andy Brown, Paul Hackett Evans, David Sargent and Roddy all improved their scores. Graham Thomas won the next race by over three laps and improved to 35.08 laps. Charlie won the next race and equaled Chris on 35.50 to move into joint second place. Chris took second place back with 35.90 laps in the next race but Paul still topped the table with his first round 36.06 laps.

 The third round of heats started with Andrew winning again and improving by over two laps to 29.32 laps. No one improved in the next two races. Andy ,Roddy and David all improved again in the next race with David winning on 32.21 laps to move into sixth place overall. Graham Thomas won the next race and set the top Falcon score of 35.17 laps which proved good enough for a place in the A final. No one improved in the next two races.

Finals

The first final was contested by youngsters John Gooding, Alex Hackett Evans and Alistair Bucknell. John won by 3 laps with Alex taking second. The next Final was won by Steve Smith with 45 laps with Matthew Green Second and Roddy third. Nation production champion Glynn Taylor won the E final from Andrew Hogg, Christopher Green and Paul Bucknell. Andy Brown won the D final from youngster Matthew Siddall and Paul Hackett Evans. Ernest Danyi finished fourth in this final but did well to get into this final on his first visit to the track. Ralph Parker won the C final from Stephen Siddle and Dave Homer. Martin Ellis did not start this race as he was more interested in completing a suduko puzzle. Sandy Parker who made it into the A final at Oaklands last year had to be content with victory in the B final this time taking an easy 4 laps victory over Super production runners Steve Sargent and Chas Keeling. Onto the A final which was once again, as it was last year, contested by Paul Sheperd, and Chris and Graham Thomas. Charlie Gooding being the only change to last years line up. The final proved to be two races in one with Paul and Chris battling for the win and Charlie and Graham battling for third. From the start Chris went into the lead which was extended to over half a lap when Paul had an off. Graham was struggling with his Falcon to keep up with the pace of Charlie’s super production car. After about 3 minutes Chris was still the leader by about half a lap from Paul with Charlie a couple of laps back was about 30 parts ahead of Graham. Towards the end of the race Chris slowed slightly and Paul closed the gap and eventually Chris won by just 9 parts. Charlie had a couple of offs which allowed Graham into third which he eventually took by over a lap. So the first three was a repeat of last year and this was the eighth consecutive Oaklands B.S.L victory for Chris.

Oaklands Team Race

We had to be finished by 17:30 so it was decided to have 12-minute segments for the team race.

With 13 teams it was decided that we would run with a group of 5 and two groups of 4. The group of 5 contained the top five teams and four of these were in heat 1 with SDS taking the sit out. After his win in the A final Chris set the pace on his favorite Red lane with 146.09 laps, a score that was to be the best run of the day. Charlie was just over 6 laps back, with Paul another 4 laps adrift on 135.90 and Stephen Siddall 20 laps adrift of the leader. Heat 2 had the middle level of teams of which Laurel and Hardy and FF Tokyo drift had home drivers taking their first leg. Ralph also had a good run on Red lane and put Laurel and Hardy into second place overall on 141.91 with Dave Homer having a good run on Yellow lane recording 138.13laps. The third heat saw the four teams that contained at least 1 junior driver. However for the first leg Time Lords and Sith Lords were both represented by the Dads in their teams. But it was super junior Matthew Siddall that won the heat with 134.30 laps a score that put his team into 4th place overall. The second round of heats saw SDS take their first run with overall leaders Oakland's taking a sit out. Glynn was just 4 laps short of Charlie's first run in winning heat 4 to move CMG Slots B into the overall lead.

In heat 5 Ralph, 140.82 laps, produced another good run to put Laurel and Hardy into the lead with Sandy just over a lap behind on Yellow lane. In third place after heat 6 were FF Tokyo drift thanks to two good runs by Dave Homer. Heat seven saw the return of Oakland's with Graham having trouble overtaking the traffic he finished 5 laps down on Chris's first run but still won the heat by a lap from Charlie. Sandy Parker won heat 8 for the A9run team and Roddy was wondering how to tell Richard Wallace that he was no longer required. Paul Hackett Evens took heat 9 for the Time Lords. Graham won heat 10 for Oaklands and this time with a much clearer run recorded 146.07 laps just 2 parts of a lap short of Chris's best run of the day. Glynn struggled on Red lane but his 132.07 laps set the total target of 547.05 laps, as CMG slots B were the first team to complete their four runs. Only two teams, Oakland's and Laurel and Hardy could realistically hope to better the CMG slots B total. Heat 12 saw Andy drive for Laurel and Hardy but his 130.55 laps was only enough to secure third overall. In the last Heat Chris had white lane and despite a few problems the overall victory was never in doubt and his score of 141.91 laps gave Oakland's the win by 28.13 laps. A9 run finished in fourth place with Sandy using her home track knowledge to record two very good scores. In fact Ralph and Sandy Parker both had good runs in the team race and had they been in the same team their total of 559.58 laps would have given them second place by over 12 laps.

The new security measures at the Harry Mitchell centre meant that we had to be out of the hut by 17:30 which we managed with a couple of minutes to spare. This was achieved by the cooperation of everyone present with little time wasted between the 1/32^nd event and the team race and also by people being prompt to get to their marshalling positions so a thank you to everyone. Apologies to Charlie Gooding, who having received a warning for not marshalling then moved away from the track half way through the heat holding his knee. I thought at first that he was just trying it on and I started laughing at him but then realized that he had suffered an injury to his knee caused by a screw which had worked itself loose and was projecting by over an inch from the track fence. It was not a good day for the Gooding’s with John also suffering a head injury whist playing football in the car park..

 With the enforced early finish at Oaklands most people were at Dudley by 6 o’clock for the evening practice session and curries.

1/24th Team Results