Race Report - Rowrah S4 Rd4
ABkC 125 KZ2
After the low point of the season which was Fulbeck, a couple of weeks passed and the series rocked up at Rowrah. Different from any other venue on the calendar, it offers unrivalled viewing, facilities, and occasionally weather!! It is also the only venue in the series to have a rolling start, due to the lack of run-off at the start, but all the starts passed off without incident.
Attitudes were better at this round as well, possibly due in part to what management types might call a “strong steer” in the morning brief. Those of us of a certain age will recognise it more as an old fashioned pre-race shouting at.
We also ran four heats for the 125’s which kept the numbers down on track and lessened the chances of the little darlings colliding with something large and heavy, whether through design or incompetence.
Slicks were in use all day, and with the track well rubbered in from recent meetings despite the occasional deluge, there appeared to be no tyre issues at all.
Heat wins went to Dafydd Iles (2), Joe Charlton and Matt Dittman, with James Mudd lowering the lap record on the second heat by 4/10th of a second. Very many drivers were circulating under the old record, so the track and the drivers were quick all day.
BREAKING NEWS – Iles managed to keep the same chassis for two meetings!!
All that (generally pretty good) action left Iles on pole from Charlton and Borton, with Tom Moore completing row two from Liam Morley and James Mudd with Tom Duggan and Matt Dittman on the 4th from James Glenister and Tom Witts. Finally, a reasonably representative grid of what passes for the cream of the UK’s 125 driving talent.
Iles got the start bang on and powered off the line trailed by Charlton and Borton, but we had drama at the first hairpin as Johnny Buchanan spanked the barriers hard, which meant the Battenburg flags came out to neutralise the pace while some rapid rebuilding went on. A couple of laps later and the green flew from the start line to signal game on and the high speed action to resume. Iles continued to hold the lead, but he had Borton ever closer and it was going to be interesting to see if there would be any payback for the mild clumping that Daf gave Dan at Forest Edge. Charlton was holding his own in 3rd from a racy Moore, but Mudd and Morley were also engaged in duking it out with a very attentive Duggan and Dittman with Jon Church also having a play. At just under half distance, we still had the first 20 drivers separated by a mere SEVEN seconds!!
The next tour saw Jason Edgar drop to the back after a close encounter of the barrier kind and, although he’d recover a bit, it was a poor ending to his home round.
Meanwhile, back at the sharp end, Iles was still nowhere near far enough clear of Borton, but they had pulled a slight gap on Charlton who had some breathing space over the massive scrap involving Mudd, Moore, Morley, Dittman and Duggan. Places were swapping frantically as the drivers tried out braking, cut backs, drafting and even gathering up the mother of all slides to gain an advantage. None of it really worked, but it was great to watch. The order then seemed to settle down, but the pace never slackened as gaps reduced over the last few laps in an attempt to force the issue on the final few corners.
Gaining in all this was Charlton, his mid-race breather leading to some really quick stuff at the end and finishing a mere 1/10th off the second placed Borton, who was a couple of tenths away from the winner – the delighted Iles.
Fourth was Mudd from Moore, with Morley completing the top six, Duggan sneaking past Dittman on the last lap with Josh Mulholland ousting James Glenister from 9th on the same tour.
This was much better from the KZ’s and I hope they can carry this on to the next round at Shenington in September.
Result
1st Dafydd Iles Tony/ TM
2nd Daniel Borton BRM/TM
3rd Joe Charlton CRG/TM
4th James Mudd Energy/TM
5th Tom Moore Tony/TM
6th Liam Morley Tony/Vortex
ABkC 250 National
One notable thing about this meeting was the weather. Having forecast torrential rain for Saturday testing and the odd shower on race day, it was glorious sunshine on Saturday and some extended sunny spells on Sunday. We do normally get the rain here in what can only be described as biblical and horizontal quantities, so the sun was an added bonus in summer.
Plagues of locusts and frogs are chucked in as optional extras.
Slightly fewer drivers here than at Fulbeck, but the cream all turned up and were pretty quick to boot. The Hoff lowered the lap record by 1/100th in heat one, then took another one off in heat 2. Altering the gearing for the last two races put paid to any further progress, but he felt there was some more time to come.
His Hoff-ness took a couple of heat wins with Lee Stamp getting the other one, but retired in heat three leaving him with some work to do for the final.
Pole went unsurprisingly to the Hoff from Nick Willcox and Ian Thomson, Lee Stamp completing the second row. Steve Pipes and Alex Burrows had the third row from Richard Morris and Ron Stamp, with the grid completed by Tim Woods and Martin Smith.
Hassall had a problem on the rolling lap as his clutch cable broke (as it had earlier in the day), leaving him with no way of stopping without stalling and grateful for Rowrah’s rolling starts!
However, he managed to get the start right and led off from Willcox and Thomson, Stamp Jr slotting into 3rd before the end of the lap with Stamp Sr and Woods ending in an untidy heap exiting hairpin 1, only Ron resuming.
Lee was on a mission now, Willcox definitely in his sights and he swept past on the third tour and set off in search of the Hoff. It looked to be going to plan, reducing a three second gap to one, before an engine problem intervened and Lee had to sacrifice pace for a finish.
Thomson was now into third place, despite having the gearing too high as a result of having to comply with newly-introduced axle regs – and no sign of an F1 climb-down – and he was able to take full advantage of Lee’s reduced pace to annexe the runner-up spot.
Lee’s misery was complete as he ceded the final podium place to Willcox with three to go and just hung on in the final few laps to get the all important finish. Having had one from Forest Edge, he wasn’t about to repeat the experience.
A fantastic four way scrap had been going on between Burrows, Morris, Pipes and Ron for 5th place (yes I know Ron was a lap down, but it didn’t stop him having a play with the chaps, did it?), but we lost Pipes on the last lap and so 5th went to Burrows from Morris with Martin Smith a lonely 7th from Pipes and Ron.
Result
1st James Hassall Jade/Honda
2nd Ian Thomson Energy/Honda
3rd Nick Willcox Jade/Honda
4th Lee Stamp PVP/Honda
5th Alex Burrows Jade/Honda
6th Richard Morris Jade/Honda
Report by Iain Blair
Pics by Sharon Blair.
