JONNY COMES MARCHING HOME

McMullan joins an illustrious list of previous Formula Ford champions – Photo: Rachel Bourne

It was gloriously sunny at Anglesey Circuit during the final weekend of September when the BRSCC’s North Western Centre laid on a very entertaining weekend of action.

The most prestigious races were the final two rounds of the Avon Tyres National Formula Ford 1600 Championship. Northern Irishman, Jonny McMullan, clinched the Post89 title in fine style. He was the quickest driver at Friday’s test day before going on to record a clean sweep of two poles, two wins and two fastest laps during the course of the meeting. The only minor blot on his copybook was when Jake Byrne held the lead for half a lap at the start of the opening encounter.

In only his second season in any form of racing, Patrick Dussault secured the runner-up place in this hotly contest series. By the time he had overtaken Jake Byrne for second in race 1, McMullan was out of reach while in Sunday’s contest Tom McArthur defended third place vigorously before Dussault out-foxed him at Rocket on lap 3 by which time the title-winner elect was 5 seconds down the road with David McArthur in hot pursuit. The latter finished third the previous day.

The Pre90 National Championship was a straight shoot-out between Matthew Cowley and Jamie Jardine. The former had a 13 point advantage coming into the weekend and things were looking good when he took the lead of the opener following a restart after David Murphy came to rest in the middle of the final corner when a left rear wheel and hub assembly parted company with his car. But on lap 2 Jaap Blijleven managed to draw alongside Jardine through Church before out-braking him and Cowley to establish a race-winning advantage at Rocket.

Cowley kept Jardine at bay for a few more circuits but eventually the reigning title holder overhauled him and was immediately followed through by John Farrell who was having a one-off outing in the UCLAN-run Reynard 89FF of Andrew Thomas. Before the chequered flag came out, Cowley was able to regain third meaning his advantage was reduced to 10 points prior to the final Pre90 National round. This he led from lights to flag after Jardine made a poor start and briefly dropped behind Mario Sarchet. Jardine reeled in the leader and put him under enormous pressure in the closing stages but Cowley displayed great calmness to take both the win and the Championship.

The Fun Cup runners had two 3 hour races, the first of these was run on Saturday afternoon and saw the lead constantly being swapped between Marcus Clutton’s team and Racelogic with Team Honeywell and JPR’s UVio squad also in the mix. Marcus Clutton along with his team mates, Peter Belshaw and Phil Keen eventually came out on top. They did the double that evening when the second encounter provided some exciting night racing as it did not finish until 11 pm. The teams and drivers expressed their gratitude to the marshals who continued to provide safety cover throughout the day and into the night.

A triple header concluded the 2015 XR Challenge. The first outing came to a head when the first 3 cars collided at the super-fast Church Corner. All continued with Justin Roberts the least delayed and able to take victory – both overall and in the XR2 Class. The XR3i winner, Lee Bowron, was the second man home ahead of the recovering Greg Speight and Michael Heath who had Lee Shropshire between them. Bowron’s son, Ryan, was the first XR3i home in Sunday’s two thrashes.

Having retired on the second lap of Saturday’s XR contest, Steve Poole had to start from twelfth on the grid on Sunday morning. Nonetheless he was soon at the front of the field where he became part of a 4 car fight with the leading protagonists from the previous day – Roberts, Speight and Heath. When Roberts ran wide at The Banking, Speight took a lead that he was never to lose despite the other 3 drivers trying everything they knew.

Speight went from hero to zero in the final race of the XR season when a rear wheel parted company with his car. This enabled Poole to come home first ahead of Heath (who claimed the XR2 Championship) and Roberts. This season’s XR3i title went to Michael Taylor.

Our guests from the CNC Heads Sports/Saloon series provided a huge grid of cars for their brace of races both of which were won by Garry Watson.

You can view the full results at ANGLESEY RESULTS.

Dave Williams