Round 2 – Sunday 13th May 2007.

The weather forecasters were telling us that the second round of the 2007 championship was destined to have rain, but the big question was when ? When Baz and I were up the track Saturday afternoon getting everything ready the conditions were perfect, and we both wished we were running on Saturday but we weren’t so we would just have to deal with the weather as it came.

Everyone arrived nice and early and scrutineering went without a hitch. The drivers briefing was finished by 08.45 and we were all at the track by 09.00.

Once again Baz had introduced some new links into the track which weather permitting we would use later in the day.

18 drivers lined up for stage 1 which was the quick stage missing out the two in field sections. Everyone got a fairly dry run in on stage 1 as did the first half of the field on stage 2 but the drivers in the second half of the field all found that by the time they had their run conditions had deteriorated and most were between 45 and 60 seconds slower than their first runs.

Things evened themselves up a bit on stage 3 as it was the first few cars out that had the worst of the conditions, with the bottom corners in particular proving very difficult with virtually no grip at all, regardless of the type of tyres you were running.

Stage 4 was probably the stage that had the most consistent conditions for all the competitors and the stage times started falling.

With 4 stages completed it was time for lunch and a chance for the marshals to get some relief from the rain. However, during lunch the weather closed in and the rain became more persistent. It was decided to call it a day after stage 4 and the results would stand. Everyone made their way back to the club house to warm up and watch the end of the Spanish Grand Prix.

In Class A Roy Gravestock came home in first position with Peter Morris in a very good second in class and Alex Cannon in third. Alex set some very competitive times but was one of the unlucky ones who got caught out by the rain on stage 2 dropping 50 seconds, an amount you are never going to make up over 2 more stages.

In Class B Jim Hedgecock continued to get use to his MkI and came away with a well deserved first in class. Mike Bishop continued his good performance from the first round with another second in class and yours truly came home third in class. Craig and Sam Schofield were out for the first time this season in Craigs Escort. Craig was soon into the swing of it throwing the Escort around in flamboyant fashion, however he did have to keep one eye on the temperature gauge as his water pump needed replacing

In the Junior Class Alex took maximum points with Polly putting in some of her best driving yet coming home second junior.

Well done to Tom Cannon in his Mini and Andrew Springett in the RPM Skoda. It was both Tom and Andrews first drives at our venue and in challenging conditions both drove well and their times improved on each stage.

Despite the poor weather everyone seemed to enjoy their day and if you had the weather on your side you were lucky.

There were no incidents to report but driving the stages the posts, bales and interesting lines on some of the corners certainly showed the conditions had been a challenge.

Thanks to all the marshals who braved the weather to help keep the event running as long as it did.

We now have nearly 4 weeks to the next event on 10 June 2007. Don’t forget to get your entry in early as we are nearing capacity, rumour has it that we may be running the stage in the opposite direction.

Darren Knights
Chairman.

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