Barnton - Round 5 - 12th July

Ecurie Barnton BSL 2008 – Meeting Report

The Ecurie Barnton round of the BSL series took place on Saturday 12th July 2008, attracting a healthy entry of 24 racers from as far apart as Invergordon and North London.

1/32 racing

*NB - Super Prod runners had 100 added to score to rank.

Murray Wallace won the first heat in 21.36, the fastest Junior time in the first round of heats. His club-mate Andrew Hogg took the early lead in Novice Falcon with 23.16, but fastest overall was Ross Grogan with a new Falcon lap record of 29.17.  Ian Fisher set the early pace in Super Production with 27.36.

The second round saw Andrew improve to 24.60, which would stand as the best Novice Falcon time of the day. Alan Lucas did 27.77 for 2nd place in Open Falcon and Ian tied his first heat time, which would stand as fastest qualifier in Super Production.

Matthew Siddall saved his best for last, 23.18 in his third heat being fastest Junior time of the day. Meanwhile Keith Charles moved up to 2nd overall with 28.26. The final Open Falcon heat threatened some fast times early on, but a scrappy second half left Charlie Gooding as 4th qualifier for the A final with the 26.95 he did earlier. David Sargent made a big improvement, but not quite enough to overtake his Dad for 2nd in Super Production.

John Gooding won the F final by a lap and a half from Roy Munro with John Munro 3rd. We then had a very close race between Ernest Danyi and Steve Smith in the E final, Ernie winning by only 10 parts. Katy Fawcett’s 3rd place made her 2nd-top Junior, just ahead of Murray.

Roddy Morrison won the D final by less than a lap from newly-promoted Premier Grade Martin Ellis. Andrew’s 3rd place gave him 1st in Novice Falcon, just ahead of Matthew who was top Junior of the day.

A closely contested C final was won by Neil Grogan by half a lap from Richard Wallace. Stephen Siddall and Norman Fawcett followed on, both within 2 laps of the winner.

The B final, containing the top Falcon runners, was even closer. Ross had a comfortable lead at one point, but some late offs allowed Keith to close the gap to about half a lap. Charlie was slightly over half a lap further back, pipping Alan for 3rd place by just 5 parts.

The Super Production final was also close at the top, Ian winning by 18 parts from David whose pace continued to improve as the day wore on. Steve took 3rd and Chas was 4th.

1/24 racing

Neil gave GSR Design the early lead with 92 laps in the first heat of the team race. Alan (E.B. Gee Bees) beat that with 95 in the 2nd heat, but this in turn was well beaten by Charlie (CMG Slots) in heat 3. Charlie’s time of 100.27 was the best of the whole race by a considerable margin. Other good times in the first segment were 94 for Morecambe Security (Martin), and 90 for both SCD Roadhogs (Ian) and Dad’s Taxi (Stephen).

Charlie went again in the 2nd segment and had another excellent run, 97 laps, to extend CMG Slots’ lead. GSR Design also put the same driver up again and Neil’s 94 moved them up to 3rd, now less than a lap and a half behind E.B. Gee Bees, for whom Keith’s 92 was the only other score over 90 in this segment. Morecambe Security dropped to 4th and Dad’s Taxi overtook SCD Roadhogs for 5th place at half distance.

Fastest in the 3rd segment were Ross on 96 and Alan on 95, enough to give E.B. Gee Bees the lead by just 60 parts from GSR Design. John drove very well, but it was inevitable that he would lose time to the home teams and CMG Slots dropped to 3rd, about 5 laps down. Morecambe Security held on to 4th place and SCD Roadhogs moved up to 5th, partly due to Ian’s 91 laps and partly due to Dad’s Taxi plummeting down the leader board when their motor coughed. SDS took advantage, moving up to 6th.

So to the final segment. Ross did 95 in the 1st heat, setting E.B. Gee Bees a tough target to hold on to their slender lead. Keith managed 91, the 2nd best time of the segment, but not enough to deny victory to GSR Design. The teams in 3rd to 6th places battled it out in the final heat. SDS won the heat with Morecambe Security on the same lap, but there were no place changes. Congratulations to John for holding on to CMG Slots’ 3rd place, over 3 laps ahead of Morecambe Security. SDS Roadhogs were 5th and SDS 6th.