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Bubble,Bubble, Toil & Trouble - for the rest of the class anyway! | |
| Knocking on Heaven's Door - Neil, Andy, Roy, Martyn, Trevor, Keith and Ian at the top of a big hill! |  |
2002 was another exciting year. Neil Armstrong has really stamped his authority on the series this time and won by a big margin. Congratulations Neil. Andy Webber was deposed from his usual second place by Jon Miles. Andy came third but would have been in fourth place if reigning champion Martyn Ellis had not been hospitalised a few days before North Weald which prevented him from marshalling. We wish Martyn a speedy recovery.
There was a small entry for the final event of the year. The weather did not disappoint and steady rain arrived by lunchtime. Newcomer Rob Thompson was highest placed contender in class A2 coming 4th. In class B5 Andy Webber managed 3rd out of 12 which gave him 17 points and allowed him to pass Martyn Ellis in the overall standings. Jim Giddings came home highest placed 2WD car in class 6. Andy Davies and Jon Barltrop were 2nd and 3rd respectively in class 9 in their Mini and R8 Gordini. Darren Russell finally got amongst the silverware in class 10, collecting 2nd place. Peter Reeve brought out his circuit racing TVR Tasmin and took 2nd in class 11. Rik Lee won class 16 in the March single seater. The marshalls were kept busy all day replacing cones and pushing cars back onto the track! (Ian Crocker).
Back in the MM championship once again, this notoriously difficult venue proved the undoing of a few people. Apart from one medium length straight this course is all about handling and driver skill. The hardest part of the course is the long tightening left hander that leads to the roundabout. This is approached at about 90mph and you have to slow to about 20mph while turning and slowing all the way. The weather was good with just a fine sprinkle of rain at lunchtime that didn't affect times. The event was well run as usual and included a speed trap a few hundred meters from the start. Class 5 was won by Roy Nicholls by less than 2 tenths from Chris Fulke-Greville. Chris did one run with his boot open for most of the course leading to speculation that it was a deliberate ploy to gain downforce! Andy Webber came home in 4th spot, being one of many to spin on the aforementioned corner. At least he only did it once.... In class B6 Martyn Ellis did one of his giant-killing feats, winning the class and ending up as third fastest road car at the event. Jon Miles was second with Trevor Jones third. Neil Armstrong overshot the roundabout on his first timed run and spun at the roundabout on his second leading to his worst score of the year. Interestingly the two EVOs posted identical speeds through the speed trap at 82mph and, since it was a flat-out blast from the start for them, it throws some doubt on Neil's claim to have 60HP less than Jon! Keith Crocker had the joint fastest speed through here for a road car. He posted 86mph which was only matched by a 230HP Caterham. Ian Crocker lead class 8 on both practice runs before messing up the roundabout on his first timed run and then easing off to secure second place in class. Stephen Craig won class 10. John Hewatt was second in the small engined racing car class in his OMS. (Ian Crocker).
Having been on holiday just down the road from Longleat for the 7 days prior to the event it was obvious that the hill should be in good condition and that a number of records would fall. The day dawned slightly cloudy but got really sunny by the afternoon. Most 7oaks members had to set off around 4am or stop overnight. Jim Giddings elected to camp in the 'Hippo' field but by all accounts he was lead astray by Keith Lay and ended up in a nightclub until the small hours, negating any benefit of travelling there the previous day! However lack of sleep did not diminish his powers on the day and he recorded a fine 2nd place in the TR Register class, beating many cars on slicks and bagging 22 points. Andy Webber won class 5 with Roy Nicholls coming home in 3rd place. Andy was just a few tenths outside the class record. In class B6 it was business as usual with Neil Armstrong taking the win and lowering his own class record, although this required the use of a a special potion obtained from a local witch (see picture below!). Keith Crocker was 2nd in class with Martyn Ellis 4th. Although not competing in the Marketing Machine Nick Lake was out for the first time in 2 years in his Nissan Sunny. Nick ended the day sandwiched between Trevor and Denise Jones - what a thought! Ian Crocker won class 8 and carved a second off the class record in the process. Peter Thompson also picked up 6 points in this class in his new Lotus Elise having switched from his Porsche 911 which met an unfortunate end in a road accident. Ritchie Gatt was another 7oaks member who was present but not registered for the MM League. He came home in 3rd spot in class 10 behind the rapid Escort RS of the Rudges. (Ian Crocker).
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Bubble,Bubble, Toil & Trouble - for the rest of the class anyway! | |
| Knocking on Heaven's Door - Neil, Andy, Roy, Martyn, Trevor, Keith and Ian at the top of a big hill! | |
With Denise and Trevor Jones withdrawing their entry only Jon Miles, Roy Nicholls and Andy Webber made the long trip to Aintree and all 3 came away with some glassware but not a big bag of points in each case. Once again the 'big banger/turbo nutter' road going class (B6) proved to be less well supported ‘up North’. With the Escort out of action having possibly swallowed a stone from Harewood’s gravel trap, Jon’s Evo went into battle with the local class record-holding Sapphire Cosworth and, despite steady improvement and crowd pleasing flame throwing, ended up a second off the pace and in second place out of three. Roy and Andy also had to work to get familiar with this very fast one mile course with just three third gear bends and nasty looking Grand National fences in the run-off areas. After two practices and three timed runs (plus a fun run option) both lost out to the class record taking Elise but scalped two other Elises running. Andy destroyed one of the few straw bales in practice but settled down to get ahead of Roy for second place with Roy third out of the twelve class contenders. This was a well run event with 64ft plus total times and speed trap info all clearly displayed. We had good commentary and good weather but ideally this event needed to be linked to a Midlands based event on the Sunday to break the journey and increase the incentive to travel. (Andy Webber)
There have been a variety of courses used at Wethersfield over the years. This time it was a 1.7 mile course that used part of the old 4.5 mile course and a couple of new bits. The track was very dirty with a lot of grass growing through and one of the new straights seemed to be made entirely of gravel. A bit more suited to rally cars than sprinters and indeed there were many rally cars competing in D12, however everybody enjoyed themselves. Unfortunately there was a very fine drizzle,almost like a mist, that lasted the whole day. This did not affect grip on the practices or the first timed run, but runs 2 and 3 were no good. A 4th run was offered and this produced the best time for many people, but many others had already packed up to go home. In class 4 Ross Saville suffered yet another mechanical failure when the drop gears failed on his freshly rebuilt car. Ross has decided to call it a day for 2002 and return next year. In class 5 Roy Nicholls was on form all day taking the win from Andy Webber in 3rd place. Class 6 saw the usual strong 7oaks turnout. The EVOs were the car to beat, the 367HP EVO VII of Jon Miles leading all day until being pipped on the last run by Neil Armstrong's EVO VI. Trevor Jones took 3rd spot in his Nissan Pulsar. In class 10 Darren Russell came home 3rd, with just 0.1 seconds in hand over the next placed car. (Ian Crocker)
After a dry day before, sometime during the night the heavens opened and it was still raining in the morning. It ended up being one of those showery days which is a real pain when competing and because the ambient temperature was quite warm the surface would begin to dry quite quickly after each shower. For anyone who has never been to Harewood, it is an excellent hillclimb with quite a scary finish (just as you come out of a blind bend). It is great for spectators as you can more or less see the whole hill and there is a timing board which also shows top speed (attained just before scary finish!). They also have plans to show three split times. For the competitors they also have times and positions on permanent display on computer screens. You enter your competition number - enter – and hey presto! Up comes your position in class and everyone else’s times showing + or – against your time. There are four other screens permanently showing all classes and positions virtually being updated as it was happening. There were only five of us altogether – the Jones’, Jon Miles, Andy Webber and Roy Nicholls. (Jon Miles had taken his Escort and switched from class 3 to 2) Roy Nicholls was driving really well and was ahead of Andy Webber after both practises and the first timed run. Roy was third and Andy fourth in a class of twelve. Jon Miles was lying in second place to a Harewood regular driving a Clio Williams. But… he had a plan for his final run. Guess what – it didn’t work! However he did give the spectators and the commentator some entertainment as he often does. Roy didn’t do quite as well on his second run but Andy did a blinder and only missed out by 2/100ths to first place and he beat Jon Miles by over two seconds! So, Andy 2nd, Jon 3rd, and Roy 4th – well done all three. There should have been three timed runs but due to a few hold-ups they had to cut back to two. Shame, it would have been interesting to see what would have happened next run. It is always difficult for double driven cars to run near each other at hillclimbs and to make it worse Denise was put at the beginning of batch two and the rest of the class ran in batch five. For the two practises Denise had wet runs but by the time the rest of the class went it was much drier. Then she had quite a dry first run and although she tried hard with the rain dance it didn’t work! Still not too bad though, she was joint second with a Lancia Delta Integrale ahead of Trevor by .44 secs. She went slightly quicker on her second run ( there was some more drizzle) but the grip was there. Trevor went much quicker, knocking nearly two seconds off his first run, beating his best time ever at Harewood. He came second and Denise ended up fourth. I hope more people travel to Harewood next year, to what is an exciting and well run event. (Denise Jones)
The weekend started at Llandow circuit. 7 SDMC members made the trek to Wales. The day started with convoy runs which were run on a free practice basis with as many as you like on offer. Of course our 7 tourists took advantage of taking the opportunity to show each other their driving skills. This however did not help them avoid a host of spins and offs during the day. Only Neil Armstrong stayed on the black stuff all day, but declined to take his 3rd timed run. He thought trying to catch the class leader was likely to result in a visit to the Welsh scenery and possibly missing out on Llys y Fran the next day let alone grief from the attending family. He, then, settled for second place. Martyn Ellis just got pipped into 4th place despite a valiant effort on his final run with a spin followed by a ‘4 wheels off’ which had the clerk discussing his sanity and the offer of some headache tablets. Jim Giddings also entertained as he was the first to discover that you can’t leave braking that late at the end of the fast straight. He ended up down the run off and down the order to 12th but had a big smile on his face all day. Andy Webber likewise tried the late braking approach but put it sideways on the grass and took out the plastic barriers reopening the wound in the front wing from Wethersfield last year. He still managed to claw his way up to 3rd in class with his last run, despite ripping a hole in the side of a front tyre at the kerbed chicane going into the final bend. Roy Nicholls struggled with an uncharacteristic spin in the 205 to 5th place . Denise and Trevor Jones managed 9th and 5th in the large class. Both added to the 7oaks entertainers with routes more appropriate to the GTiR’S rally heritage. Llys-y- Fran the next day saw the same 7 tourists ready to tackle the hillclimb. The weather was much the same as Saturday, warm and dry but everyone seemed to have more concentration today. Neil was the only one to have several brushes with the tyres on corner apexes, everyone else was well behaved I think this was due to the rather deep looking reservoir they had to drive round. Neil took 3rd to the same Quattro as the previous day, Martin fought to 5th, Trevor 7th ,Jim 8th and Denise 9th in the large class. The smaller capacity class was for once a reasonable sized one. Roy improved run on run to 6th out of 8 and Andy likewise to 2nd behind Midlands speed supremo David Marshall to keep his grip on the Hill Climb trophy. (Jade Webber aged 4 months – précis from a forthcoming Acorn article)
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There was a good turnout of MM contenders for this full-day sprint at Lydden. The format was a 2.7 lap practice and 3 timed runs of 1.7 laps. After threatening rain all week the day was gloriously sunny. Jonathan Dalby took 2nd in class 2 in his 309 GTi, some way behind the extremely quick Alfa of Nathan Corridon. Class 4 had MM contenders take the top 3 slots with Mike Edwards winning, Andy Actman second and Dick Athow third. Chris Fulke-Greville won a small class 5. Both he and Andy Webber are riding high in the overall scores right now,but a continuing small class means they will soon start dropping scores and will slowly filter down the table. Class 6 was enormous as usual. Neil Armstrong was highest placed MM contender in 2nd place, the mighty EVOs knocked off the top spot by one of the legendary Nissan Skyline GTRs which turned in the fastest road legal time of the day. Neil did turn the tables on Jon Miles' EVO VII though which ended up in 3rd position. Keith Crocker was highest placed 2WD car in this class once again. David Offen was the only contender in the small kit car class, coming home in 6th place after being absent from sprinting for over a year. Ian Crocker won class 8 with his second timed run and then promptly stuffed it into the earth bank on his last timed run causing a fair bit of damage to the car. However, thanks to the efforts of brother Keith, Jon Miles and Chris Fulke-Greville the car made it home under its own power albeit with no electric fan and a radiator held in with cable-ties. The Craig brothers took 1st and 2nd in class 10, Nigel winning and going on to win his race there the very next day as well. Class 12 was boosted in numbers by a bunch of GT40s. Rik Lee came home 3rd in the 6R4 and collected 20 points for doing so. (Ian Crocker)
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Not as impressive as Darren's but bent suspension and a lot of front-end damage on Ian's Westfield. |
For those of you with broadband connections there are a couple of videos of Ross Saville trying his hardest to copy his friend Darren: Ross 1 (5.3MB) and Ross 2 (3.6MB). And one of me (14MB). These videos require the DivX codec available at www.divx.com. It is best to right click the link and 'save target' then play them from your hard disk. You are unlikely to be able to stream them from the website.
The weather was beautiful for BARC's Goodwood. A warm track, fairly cool air and little wind had many people hoping for a personal best. However this was not to be. Early in practice somebody blew their engine and left a 400m oil slick right on the racing lane all the way from Fordwater to St Marys. There was so much oil that all of the circuit's cement was used up, then all of BARC's, and then a trip to a local builders was necessary. Then, just before lunch another car lost all its oil on the approach to, and all through, Woodcote. At lunchtime an intrepid band of 7oaks members actually walked the course - something not many people can have done down there. Rumour has it that Jim Giddings' dog would not be getting a walk that night! As a result of all this there was only time for one timed run and most people did not produce anything like their best times. Ross Saville and Darren Russell both used their road cars in class 2 after problems with their competition cars. Ross took 3rd in his MR2 while Darren had a heavy off in his ZX after spinning at the chicane on his first timed run. Chris Fulke Greville won class 5 with Andy Webber second. Jon Miles won class 6 in his Evo VII Extreme S and scored a massive 27 points. Neil Armstrong was second in his antiquated Evo VI... Only joking Neil! Graham Pryme was another Sevenoaks member to crash, making a return to sprinting in his lovely Matra after a long absence. The Jones' had a turbo boost problem which left them floundering near the bottom of the class. Ian Crocker was 3rd in class 8 which seems to be getting quite big these days. Rik Lee won class 12 for 16 points in his 6R4. (Ian Crocker)
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This popular event features two sprints in one day and a field of 150 cars including 25 for the Cooper Challenge. The 'Abingdon' course is a very fast sweeping course while the 'Bentley' course is a series of 90 degree bends and hairpins with short straights in between. The field is split in 2 and each half tackles one course in the morning and the other in the afternoon. Trophies are decided on aggregate score. Dick Athow was the only contender in class 4, taking second place in the lovely Renault Alpine. Chris Fulke-Greville won class 5 from Andy Webber. In class 6 Neil Armstrong had a big off in practice, running over the fire extinguishers at the finish line and doing a fair bit of damage to the drivers side of his car. However Ian Gibson assured me that this was nothing for an Evo VI (!) which are used to hitting trees in the forests and Neil carried on to take the big class and score 22 points. Keith Crocker was the highest placed 2WD car in that class getting 4th place. Ian Crocker won class 8, finally getting revenge on a certain Exige! Class 12 saw the battle of the 6R4s, series sponsor Rik Lee pitting his 700HP bi-turbo against the 480HP ex-works car of Ali Serpen. In the morning, on the Bentley course, Ali was 0.6 seconds ahead. With lots of low speed corners this course is difficult for turbo cars because of the time taken to spool up the turbos leaving the corners. However in the afternoon Rik's massive horsepower, and huge gonads, took him to a 1.1 second margin for the class win. Ali was pushed down to 3rd spot by Gino Cuomo. Neil's accident with the extinguishers was bettered by a Metro driver who took out a marshall at the same part of the track. Despite a heavy dent by the A pillar, and the marshall's head breaking the windscreen, he was fortunately OK save for a broken wrist and was due to help out again the following day for the rally! (Ian Crocker)
The weathermen were not far wrong unfortunately! Heavy black clouds kept passing overhead bringing fierce rain that would disappear as rapidly as it started. This mean't that, apart from one practice, all runs were wet. Conditions were at their best for first timed runs for most people and this was where most of the quickest times came from. On a day where even the lowest powered cars could get wheelspin most of the way down the straight to the roundabout the 4 wheel drive brigade had a field day. Ross Saville won a big class 4 to score 17 points. Chris Fulke Greville won class 5. In class 6 the action was very close (if you had 4 wheel drive!) with Neil Armstrong winning, and holding FTD until the dying moments of the event when Ali Serpen finally got his act together and hustled his 6R4 into top spot. In fact class 6 had 5 cars in the overall top 10. Martyn Ellis had a day to forget, picking up a mere 5 points in class 6. Andy Davies won class 9 in his Mini. Colin Billings was runner up in class 10 with a very quick time in his rally Golf GTi. Jon Miles is obviously itching to use that new Evo VII of his as he was pleading to be allowed to use it as a 'course closing car'! (Ian Crocker)
A very early start for most 7Oaks members saw light drizzle on the way to the Lotus Cars Test Track. However this had stopped by 7am and the rest of the day was gloriously sunny. The track was dry all day. This is a very technical venue and a quick look down the results sheet will bear this out. Many people who are normally quick struggle at this event and instead of the times slowly getting quicker as you move up through the classes they tend to be all over the place. Ross Saville came 2nd in class 4 despite having to add about as much oil to his car as most people add petrol! Class 5 was won by Jon Miles in his RS2000. Chris Fulke-Greville posted a much faster time on his last run but just clipped a cone and had 5 seconds added to his time for second place. In a big class 6 Martyn Ellis posted an identical time to an Impreza but took the win based on their slower times. Neil Armstrong was in 3rd spot with Trevor Jones 4th. Ian Crocker was the highest placed MM contender in a large class 8, coming home 5th out of 13. Nigel Craig won class 10. Jon Miles' wife brought up his new toy to try and speed up the running-in process - a Mitsubishi Evo VII Extremas which should be very competitive in class 6. As I write this the forecast for the next round at North Weald is thunder and lightning - is that place cursed or what ? (Ian Crocker)
Torrential rain greeted most competitors when they got out of bed on Bank Holiday Monday. Lydden circuit was wet for first practice and slowly dried out so that for final runs the startline was the only wet part of the track. Jonathan Dalby's 309 GTi was beaten into second place in class A2 by a 405 Mi16. David Balderson was beaten into last place in A3 by a host of much more powerful and modern machinery. In class B4 Mike Edwards took a good win in his Mini with Ross Saville coming 3rd in another Mini. Chris Fulke-Greville took class B5 with Andy Webber trailing in last place - what a difference a week makes! Jon Miles took one look at the weather and used his Evo VI instead of the RS2000 that he had been polishing the day before. He won B6 by a comfortable margin and was 6th fastest overall. Trevor Jones was third in this class, just pipping reigning champion Martyn Ellis. Ian Crocker came second in class C8. Sam Colins had to run his ageing Golf in D10 after forgetting to bring his insurance documents - needless to say everyone else was on slicks and he came last! (Ian Crocker)
The hill was initially in very poor condition – quite literally “green”- following high winds and rain the previous day and first practice times were some of the slowest ever seen. 7oaks representation was confined to 5 in B5 and 2 in B6.with several of the “usual suspects” present. Late arrival saw Jon Miles straight off the trailer on to the start line and suffering some rough running as the cobwebs were blown out of Roland Hayes’ finest. Chris F-G had lost a lot of water on the way down but was best of the B5 FWD contingent on a track that favours RWD (or of course 4WD). Andy Webber was present without the usual supporters and was under remit to return in time to take over the training of the new team arrival (so that’s now a double driven Elan in about 16 years’ time ?). Roy Nichols was debating a return to old technology carburettors to improve the overworked single plenum. Gareth Richardson was also distracted by thoughts of a team addition later in the year. Come first timed runs , a close look at the bank at Wis Corner failed to put Andy Webber into the usually-anticipated 2nd by a few 10ths over Jon Miles slightly bogged start to take that spot. Chris F-G took 3rd before retiring with a suspect head gasket. Roy Nichols was 5th behind the Golf of a local specialist and Gareth Richardson completed the 7oaks domination of a closely-fought B5. Trevor and Denise Jones tied up 2nd and 3rd in B6 , despite always seeming to be busy with the inevitable extra work of double driver change-overs when your reporter was about to seek news on progress. Steady rain , rather than the forecast showers , made its appearance as the first cars lined up for 2nd runs , rendering the rest of the event a wet weather practice session. (Keith Lay)
Apart from a sprinkling of rain towards the end of practice the weather was fine for the season opener. Nobody had any accidents and only a few people visited the gravel traps.In class A2 (amalgamated with A0) Jonathan Dalby took 4th in his 309. Class B4 was made up entirely of Marketing Machine competitors and Mike Edwards took the win. Unfortunately Lincoln Cooper's Autobianchi came back from practice with a steady stream of oil from underneath and had to retire. Chris Fulke-Greville won a small class B5. Neil Armstrong returned to the series and demolished the opposition in class B6. Ian Crocker took second in class C8, some way behind the winning Exige of Tim Stevens. Nigel Craig was 2nd in D10 in the slick-shod Escort RS2000. In class E12 Ric Lee's 6R4 Bi-Turbo was deemed too noisy during practice and banned. This was a strange ruling as some of the single seaters, and even CF-G's Astra sounded louder. In class E16 John Hewat and Ric Lee came 4th and 5th, separated by just 0.08 seconds. FTD was the talented Terry Holmes in his Reynard SF84 on 74.70 seconds. (Ian Crocker)
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