Rockingham - 23rd May 2004

Qualification:

Results:

Race Report:

Conditions: Warm and sunny.

Qualifying: 

Only a few minor problems beset the Midgets in the first practice session of the day.  These seemed mainly to be fuel related, best guess, and everybody was able to take to the start.

Race: 15 minutes plus one lap - Rolling Start.

The grid assemble at the back of the paddock to be led out onto the circuit for a lap and a half behind the pace car.  Unfortunately for Paul Hutchens, borrowing Gareth Penn’s old C-class and championship winning car from previous seasons (on loan from David Price), the car decides it doesn’t want to play.  Unlucky Hutchens retires before the race begins.

The rest of the pack does its tour, and the pace car peels off.  The red lights go out, and the race is on. 

Reeve, on Pole, has the inside line.  As the field stream down the pit straight Reeve goes to the outside, Perry is up into second, briefly, before Storrar gets ahead.  Reeve, meanwhile, takes to the sportscar circuit and starts to pull away. 

Meanwhile, in Class C the field is close.  Pymm, however, had a poor start and is uncharacteristically close to the back of the field.

Smallridge and Penn put the pressure on Perry as they exit the infield and go high onto the banking.  Into Turn 4 Storrar takes the high line, Perry comes down to the inside, and with Reeve in the middle, the three Class A cars come onto the Pit Straight three abreast.  Penn and Smallridge are just behind, and before long, Penn takes third from Perry.

Paul is ahead of Prosser, but Prosser takes the position from him on the entrance to the chicane. 

On the entrance to Turn 4 for the second time, Reeve loses the lead to Storrar as he comes scorching round into the pit straight.  Reeve is well placed to make a move on him at the chicane, but doesn’t make it. Smallridge is on the outside of Penn, and Perry is in fifth. 

At the end of lap 2 the race order is: Storrar, Reeve, Penn, Smallridge, Perry, Turner, Vizor, Blanchett, Sapcote leading Class C from Dignan, Langford, Actman, Mooney, Prosser, Draycott, Barker and Self.

The battle for third place is hot between Penn, Smallridge and Perry.  Yellow flags are waved at the chicane, and Smallridge recovers himself from the grass to rejoin the circuit.  He has lost a couple of places, however.

Reeve is not letting Storrar get too far away.  The gap is 1.2 seconds.   At the end of lap 4 the order is Storrar, Reeve, Perry, Penn, Turner, Smallridge, Vizor 10.5 seconds down, Blanchett, Dignan, Langford, Sapcote, Actman, Mooney, Prosser, Barker, Draycott, Pymm, Self.

But Reeve closes up again.  At the end of Lap 5 the gap is reduced to three quarters of a second.

Sapcote had been leading Class C in the early stages, then dropped to third in one corner.  Now, he’s back ahead of Langford and right on Dignan’s tail.  Prosser and Draycott are enjoying a fantastic fight in the infield. 

Reeve has set the fastest lap so far, at 1.15.843 seconds. He is climbing all over the back of Storrar at the hairpin.  Meanwhile in Class B, the recovering Smallridge is once more ahead of Turner.

Actman closes right in on Langford as they exit the infield section and rejoin the banking.  At the same part of the circuit, Draycott goes high on the outside of Prosser, and eventually gets ahead at the chicane.  This is currently the closest on-track action with a gap of 0.166 seconds between them over the line.

Eight minutes remain on the clock. 

As they crossed the line at the end of lap 5 the race order is Storrar, Reeve, Perry, Penn, Smallridge, Turner, Vizor, Blanchett, Dignan, Sapcote, Langford, Actman, Mooney, Barker, Prosser, Draycott, Pymm, Self.

During lap 6 Storrar has just done the new fastest lap: 1.15.833.  He is 0.3 seconds ahead of Reeve, but this falls to 0.8 seconds on the completion of the next tour.

Langford looks as though he is lining Sapcote up, as they fight over second place in Class C.  Sapcote retains his position at the chicane.  Meanwhile, Mooney is being harassed by Barker, but Draycott has pulled comfortably away from Prosser. 

Into the hairpin, Sapcote takes a wide entry, and on the subsequent turn the red cars of Langford and Actman aren’t far behind.  At the far end of infield section, the cars fighting for second in class are allowing Dignan to race ahead.  As they come back onto the banked circuit Langford goes for the inside line, Sapcote on the higher, outside line.  But the class position they’re fighting over changes from second to first, as Dignan slowly cruises to a standstill.  The white flag is waved for him as he comes down the pit straight and parks up on the grass just before Turn 1.

Sapcote is now back in the lead of Class C. 

At the end of lap 8 the race order is: Storrar ahead of Reeve by 1.8 seconds, then Perry 13 seconds adrift.  In Class B, Penn leads Smallridge by 6 seconds, followed by Turner, with Vizor half a minute behind and Blanchett 3 seconds down on him.  Class C is very close.  Sapcote leads Langford by 0.38 seconds. Actman is only 1.6 behind, followed by Barker 3.6 seconds back, Mooney just 0.7 down on him, then Draycott 3.5 behind, Prosser now a closer 0.6 seconds back.

Another Class C car retires, with Barker joining Dignan on the grass by the end of the pit wall.

2 and a half minutes to go.

All the action is in Class C, as Actman takes Langford for second place. 

Race order at the end of lap 10 is Storrar, Reeve, Perry, Penn, Smallridge, Turner, Visor, Blanchett, Sapcote, Actman, Langford, Mooney, Draycott, Prosser, Pymm and Self.  Smallridge is 4 seconds behind Penn, Actman less than 2 seconds behind Sapcote.   But Sapcote is pulling away.  As they come round, Langford is trying to overtake Actman by going up the outside of the Turn 4 bend.  They cross the line absolutely together.  0.075 seconds apart.

The last lap board is shown.

Reeve looks like he has closed the gap to Storrar, now just 4 cars lengths as they climb the banking for the final time.  But the checquered flag is prepared, and taken by Storrar 0.526 seconds clear of Reeve.

Half a lap away, meanwhile, its all going on in the infield.  Other As and Bs are overtaking the leading Cs and Langford is ahead of Actman.

Perry comes round to take third, and Smallridge gets past Penn to take victory in Class B.  Sapcote takes his first class win in the Midget Challenge, Langford holds on just 0.279 seconds and over the line, Pymm overtakes Prosser to gain an extra point for his championship challenge.

Midget Gems:

Peter Blanchett: The only thing I can say is I finished.  Yippee!  I drove like an idiot in qualifying, slightly better in the race.  Couldn’t catch Howard.  But I really enjoyed it.  I finished a race at Rockingham, which is a first for me.

Paul Draycott:  I had a couple of good battles with people.  I think something fell off, or I ran over something, about ¾ of the way through.  I wasn’t a million miles away, so I’m happy.

Andrew Actman: I didn’t think I was going to do as well as I did, so I’m well chuffed.  I got called in by the stewards for being a naughty boy, overtaking under a yellow, so they tell me.  A great race.  Another dice with Langford - one of our specials, and this time he got me.

Mark Turner: I had to see how high I could lift my inside wheel.  Frustrating race really.  Will span, but then got past me again - he was flying.  Gareth wasn’t happy.

Graham Prosser:  I think most of the grandstand could probably hear the misfire.  It was a shame - same thing that happened in practice.  It was going well at the start.  Got past Paul, was challenging Andy and all of a sudden it started misfiring.   Right at the end David Pymm got me.  At least I finished.

Ed Reeve:  Good race again, good race.  I was going to dive for the chicane on about lap 4 but I decided that discretion was the better part of valour.  If I’d been that much further ahead and inside him I’d have done it, because I was quicker through the chicane than he was, and the hairpin.  But he got the power down on the straights much faster than I could.  So, I came second.

David Pymm: I messed the start up for starters.  I forgot we had to miss the chicane on the first lap, so I set myself up for it and then had to back off. Then I couldn’t catch anyone.  I got Prosser, but he had a misfire, and he thought I was a lap down on him, so he backed off.

Dominic Mooney: Bloody hard work, with no brakes.  We changed brake pads before the race and they were useless.  The race was very good though. 

Howard Vizor: I’m having some problems with the gearbox - that’s my excuse.  I can’t get third gear.  I’m pleased that I finished, and where I finished, but would have preferred to be a bit closer to Mark.  It’s boring on your own, although Peter was catching me.  I’m glad I finished.

Richard Perry:  It was rubbish!  I locked up going into the hairpin.  Gareth and William got past me and to be honest it was dangerous.  It’s such a narrow track.   It was predictable what happened between them.  They both went off the road. I think they’re pushing each other too far.  Anyway, this thing [car] is running like a dog, so I dropped back. 

Tim Storrar:  Strange rolling start.  We were told the green light would come on, but instead just the red light went out. No green.  So hesitated a bit.  Richard went down the inside but nearly cooked it down the bottom.  I latched onto Ted.  I was quicker through half, he was quicker through the other half.  But I went for a gap, got in front, and I was lucky with back markers seeing me.  Enjoyable. Be it ninth or tenth place, the main thing is to have a good battle and enjoy it.

William Smallridge:  Let’s call it close racing.  I was trying to get down the inside (of the chicane) but there wasn’t enough room for both of us.  I know he’s not very happy.  But he did seem to block me the rest of the track, and I had to get past at some point.  It was a racing incident - I wasn’t trying to ram him off the road.  In the end I got him on the last corner.

Peter Dignan:  Two bolts that holds the plate that holds the gearbox down sheared, so I lost my gears.  It was hard work up to then.  Once I got a bit of a gap on the marauding pack, they started playing with themselves, so to speak.  First time I’ve broken down in a year and a half.

Richard Sapcote:  It was a nice race.  Got ahead of Peter (Dignan) at the beginning and I thought I’d keep ahead of him. I left a little bit of a gap and he was in.  Then Ian Langford came past as well and I went from first to third in about 100 yards, which wasn’t very clever.  I had to start all over again, got Ian and kept my head down when Peter went out.  A nice win.  Very happy.  It’s one of those circuits that I like.  [note:  first ever praise I’ve heard for this circuit]

Ian Langford:  I wasn’t sure in practice if it wasn’t doing the same thing as last time.  Changed a couple of things, and all I can say now is “I’m back”.  I came off on the grass and Actman got past, but that was on a yellow flag, and we’ve both had a little talking to.  Back to our old tricks.

Paul Hutchens:  It didn’t want to go.  It was popping and banging like a complaining woman being hit round the head with a saucepan.  Not a bad race from a spectators perspective.

Nigel Barker:  Fuel troubles.  Again!  Same as practice.  Good race, though.  Managed to get myself up front, for about three seconds. I just got in the lead for my class, and went round in a circle.  Wasn’t a bad race.  Car’s quick, just the driver letting the car down.

Malcolm Self:  First time I’ve driven it.  I’ve bought an unknown quantity.  Sorted the brakes out, but this time I’ve got fuel problems.  I think.  Or could be electrical. 

Gareth Penn:  refused to comment.  According to his mechanic/friend, his problem was a lack of fuel on the last lap.