Oulton Park - 24th April 2004

Qualification:

Results:

Race Report:

Conditions: Warm and sunny.

Qualifying: 

A reasonably smooth running qualifying session by all, with remarkably even times promising a good race.  An unlucky John Helme retired to the pits without setting a time, and sat out the rest of the meeting, unable to repair his car.   Peter Blanchett and Ian Langford both had problems, but both started the race.  Paul Draycott had the world spinning at the bottom of Deer Leap, with a double 360° spin.

Race: 20 minutes.

A smokey Tim Storrar makes an excellent start for the second race running, Gil Duffy with a trademark poor start.  Storrar is first into Old Hall, Ed Reeve second, Richard Perry third down the Avenue towards Cascades and Fosters.  Peter Blanchett makes a good start from the back of the grid, allowed to start despite not having qualified.  But David Pymm gets ahead of him as they go down the Avenue.

Perry looks down the inside of Reeve, almost touching the kerb, around the hairpin, but Reeve hangs on to his second place.  The incident delays Perry and allows Gareth Penn to move up a place to third overall. 

At the end of the first lap Storrar has a good lead, followed by Reeve, Penn, Perry, William Smallridge, Gil Duffy, Mark Turner, and Peter Dignan leading Class C.

Graham Prosser, Dominic Mooney, Richard Sapcote and Ian Staines enjoy a close Class C battle. Andy Actman and Nigel Barker go through.  Behind them, Ian Langford, Paul Draycott and David Pymm all head into Old Hall Corner three-abreast.  Stuart Bramley and Peter Blanchett bring up the rear.

At Fosters, Perry re-takes third place by passing Penn.  

At the completion of lap 2, Ed Reeve is considerably closer to Storrar.  Perry is in third, then Smallridge and Penn cross the line absolutely together in their battle for the Class B lead.  Penn gets ahead of Smallridge in Old Hall Corner, but down the Avenue Smallridge looks set to re-take him.  Duffy and Turner follow.   A big gap back to eighth place and Dignan leading the C’s ahead of Prosser. 

Meanwhile, the gremlins return to Blanchett’s B and he retires. 

Across the line for the third time, Reeve goes for it, and takes the lead from Storrar, with Perry watching behind.  Smallridge takes the inside line around Old Hall and gets ahead of Penn down the Avenue.

Dignan leads the C’s followed by Sapcote, Staines, and Actman.

Reeve finishes lap 4 first, ahead of Storrar, Perry and Smallridge.  Duffy and Penn are together, Turner next, and then no one until the C’s.  Dignan, Prosser, Sapcote and Mooney side by side across the line.  Actman, Staines, Barker being taken on the inside by Pymm, Draycott not far behind, then Bramley and Langford.

On the next lap, Prosser pulls onto the grass opposite the pit lane.  Sapcote, Mooney, Actman, Staines, Pymm, Barker and Draycott make up the interesting Class C race.  Bramley, learning his racecraft in only his second ever race, is ahead of Langford.

With twelve minutes remaining on the clock, Duffy is closing in on Smallridge, and Turner is catching Penn.  At Fosters for the seventh time, Storrar is closing in on Reeve, taking Perry with him.

In Class C Sapcote and Mooney are nose to tail, virtually touching as they brake for Old Hall Corner.   Actman, Staines and Pymm follow, then Barker and Draycott.

Penn looks like he’s catching Duffy.  Fastest lap so far goes to Storrar, with 1.10.958.  But Penn’s Class B car is barely any slower, at 1.11.966.  And the fastest Class C of Dignan is 1.18. 

The second place battle in Class C is still led by Sapcote, with Mooney and Actman close at hand.  Pymm comes through to overtake Staines at Old Hall.   Reeve, Storrar and Perry lap the mid-C runners of Barker and Draycott.

Smallridge crosses the line, but is no longer pursued by Duffy as he has retired to the pits.  Penn and Turner are evenly spaced on the track behind their class leader.

Nobody seems to be gaining or losing.

9 minutes remain on the clock.

Reeve loses the lead to Storrar as Sapcote gets out of Storrar’s way but blocks Reeve.   Reeve won’t be happy!

Headlights ablaze as the leaders come across the line again.  Reeve sweeps down the inside to retake the lead once more at Old Hall Corner.  Perry is still watching and waiting in third, and comes up close behind Storrar at Fosters before suddenly dropping back.

Meanwhile something is amiss at Lodge corner - a green flag is waved at Deer Leap.  

Pymm takes a trip onto the grass at Fosters. 

At the end of lap 12, Storrar is still on the heels of Reeve 0.384 seconds separating them, with Perry some 3 seconds adrift.

Smallridge is 16 seconds behind Perry, 2.9 seconds behind that is Penn with Turner a further 6.9 seconds behind Penn. 

Dignan is 58 seconds down the road, but Sapcote is only 7.9 secs behind him.  Mooney is another 7 seconds down, then Draycott 12 seconds down, Staines 6 seconds behind, Bramley just 0.5 seconds behind him and Barker, who sounded like he was experiencing engine problems earlier, 7.7 seconds down.  Pymm passes, but Actman hasn’t made an appearance as he is the cause of the flags at Deer Leap.

The leaders come round again, and Storrar looks down the inside past the pits.  Reeve holds him back to maintain his lead, and Perry looks like he’s ready to settle for third.

Staines and Bramley have made up a lot of ground in the last couple of laps to catch Draycott, and they overtake at Old Hall.

Storrar has reduced the gap to Reeve to less than a length, and is faster at Knickerbrook and up under the bridge at Clayhill.  Storrar has a go up the outside and they race towards Druids side by side.

The last lap board is shown, as Reeve passes by, still in the lead. 

The race order at this time is: Reeve, Storrar, Perry, Smallridge, Penn, Turner, Dignan, Sapcote, Mooney, Staines, Draycott, Bramley, Barker, Pymm and Langford. 

Reeve covers the line at Knickerbrook, denying Storrar one of his last opportunities to grab the lead back.  At Lodge, Storrar looks again, but is unable to do anything about Reeve taking the chequered flag 0.543 seconds ahead of him.

Midget Gems:

Peter Blanchett: The electrics problem is still there.  I got off the line really well, but it didn’t want to go past 4000 revs. 

Gil Duffy:  I got one of my usual terrible starts!  It needs a new cam - nothing to do with me, it’s the cam!!  I had a good race.  I always enjoy racing with Gareth, but I keep thinking “he’s a Class B!”  Then I arrived at Druids and wooooh - my brake pedal went to the floor!  I’ve lost all the fluid out of the back brakes.

Paul Draycott:  It wasn’t going over 5500 revs, and sounded awful.  But I saw people pulling off left, right and centre so I thought “*** it, I’m not going to not finish!” 

Andrew Actman:  I came off.  I was doing my do or die attempt at Deer Leap to take Dominic and Richard Sapcote, because I was getting closer to them each lap, so I took a rather unconventional line that doesn’t work!  I wouldn’t recommend it to anybody because you hit the wall.

Mark Turner, in his own words (you can always email me your comments if we don’t speak in person): Practice: well rubbish, about as slow as I’ve ever been, 2 seconds at least off the pace. Race: both Gareth and I got a good start, Bill got along side me out of Druids and powered past along the straight into lodge. Unfortunately Gil got me there too, think at some point on the start Bill jumped the kerbs at Fosters, sparks everywhere!!   Followed Gil and Gareth well, but Gareth got the jump on a couple of C cars which where side by side up the Clayhill.  I didn’t, and got boxed in and had to slam the brakes on, lost out and couldn’t get back to him. Still chuffed, faster than I’ve ever been round here and I have more confidence in the car, I can throw it into corners again!!

Ian Langford:  My race was no good whatsoever.  Car is still not running.  Thought we’d fixed it.  In practice, the rotor arm went through the distributor cap.  The only thing good about today is the weather! 

Graham Prosser:  I had a good start behind Peter and managed to keep up with him until I had the same problem I had in practice - electrical.  Going really well, and enjoying it.

Ed Reeve: Interesting, great race.  He [Storrar] didn’t give up!  My tyres got a bit too warm at the end.  He got me with a backmarker at the hairpin, then I had to really work hard to get back.  I was quicker at Old Hall and Druids, he was quicker through the sharper corners, the hairpin and Lodge.

David Pymm’s mum: Dominic spun and David had to take avoiding action, so he had to go over on the grass.  He was up to fourth before then, and had time to get higher.  But then he didn’t come round for a while. 

Tim Storrar:  The race was fantastic.  Just loved it.  Clean.  Once either of us had committed the room was left there.  It was close, I was going to have a go at Lodge on the last lap.  I was right with Ed, but he was tight on the inside.  I should have gone outside, but in the heat of the moment….  The race is the main thing, as long as you can have a good battle.  Winning is nice though.

Gareth Penn: Better than Silverstone.  It was difficult with Gil because I was quicker than him in one section, and he was quicker than me everywhere else.  I knew if I overtook him he’d take me back, but I wanted to chase William.  It was still a good race with me and Will, we were both driving hard so that we both got brake fade and the tyres went off.

William Smallridge: Pretty hard work.  I didn’t look out the front window much, I was looking out the back for that black car, Gareth.  There was a bit of a gap, but not enough to be comfortable. 

Peter Dignan:  Wasn’t that easy.  Graham Prosser is getting quick.  He was staying with me at the start, when I was expecting this big gap to appear.  He did well.  After he retired I didn’t see anyone else.

Stuart Bramley:  I had a bit of a cr** start, bit of a misfire.  I had three spins.  One at Fosters, then Druids when I was chasing Ian Staines.  I was all over him, but the back end just slid out.  I got back on the circuit, but then had a problem at Old Hall.  After that I just wanted to finish to get a signature on my licence.  This is my second race! 

Richard Perry:  That was exciting!  I got a bad start, and Gareth got past.  I managed to reel the others in, and then the car was getting hotter and hotter, and I couldn’t see Gil so I dropped back.  But I was pleased in the end.

Richard Sapcote:  It was my first race in the championship and it went better than I ever expected in practice and the race, and I’m well chuffed to finish second.  I want to do as many rounds as I can and see if I can keep up with Dignan. 

Ian Staines:  I went ploughing a little bit after Old Hall, but I had a really good race.  I had trouble with my brakes and in the end I decided to coast it.  Had a good battle with Stuart Bramley, he kept spinning.