RAIN STOPS PLAY AT SILVERSTONE

Our Caterham Finals meeting on the International circuit at Silverstone last weekend produced the usual mixture of drama, excitement, disappointment and wet weather! Caterham F1 reserve driver Alexander Rossi added to the spectacle on both days performing some demonstration laps and donuts in the Caterham F1 car.

All rungs of the Caterham Motorsport ladder were on display and it was David Robinson who emerged the victor in the Supersport Championship. The High Wycombe driver did enough to see off the title challenge of rivals Mike Hart and Lee Wiggins. Robinson and Hart shared the victory spoils with Jonathan Mortimer and Wiggins third in each race respectively.

In the Roadsports, second place in the first outing was enough for Stephen Nuttall to secure the title but he left the race wins to be shared amongst Alexander Gurr and Pete Fortune, with Tony Mingoia maintaining his current good form to claim another podium finish.

As expected Ollie Taylor claimed the Avon Tyres Superlight R300 Championship, a win in race one was enough to take his points tally beyond the reach of Terry Langley, who was third behind Aaron Head. Head went onto win the final race ahead of Stuart Leonard, who finished behind Langley in third position in the points table.

Will Smith was crowned the Pistonheads.com Academy Group 2 champion at Rockingham so the battle was on between Jack Sales and Lee Bristow to see who finished second overall. Smith again showed his dominance to take the race win by less than half a second from Sales, with Bristow just another half second further back in third. And that was thus the finishing order in the Group 2 championship.

Matters were tighter in Group 1, where Henry Heaton, Nick Horton and Chris Hutchinson were all still in contention. Heaton settled the argument in emphatic fashion winning comfortably from Hutchison and Dan Livingstone.

The Avon Tracksport title was long since settled in favour of Michael Gazda, with Oliver Jarratt confirmed as second. So who would be third? Matt Dyer took that honour but he had to play second fiddle to Danny Killeen who stole all the glory with two fine wins. Dyer, Paul Lewis, Adrian Barwick and Chris Rankin were the other podium visitors.

The Academy drivers finally had their chance to see how they would fare against the drivers in the other group in what was scheduled to be a two-race Autumn Trophy. However, torrential left too much surface water on the track for the final race of the meeting to take place so the honours went to Group 2 with Jack Sales getting the better of Will Smith in what proved to be the only Trophy race. Henry Heaton maintained some honour for Group 1 by taking third.

Away from the Caterhams, the 2013 BRSCC Mazda MX5 champion Tom Roche finished the season in style with two wins. The Welsh flyer was never headed in either race, other than the opening three quarters of a lap in race one, where a surprised Alex Preston found himself briefly leading the race. With his confidence boosted, Preston went on to trail Roche home by just under 4 seconds, with Brett Smith third. Daniel Rogers showed his usual consistency to claim fourth and Jade Edwards was a creditable fifth.

In the final Mazda race of the year, all drivers coped admirably with the horrendously wet conditions. Brett Smith cemented his place as the championship runner-up with a second place finish and Alan Henderson was third, which also secured him the final slot on the championship podium, a just reward for his dependability this season. Jade Edwards saved her best until last, swapping finishing places from race 1 with Daniel Rogers.

The BRSCC OSS Championship also rounded off their season with their biggest entry of the season for the triple-header. Tony Sinclair scored the most points with two wins and a second, Craig Fleming being the other victor. However, Doug Hart also made two visits to the podium claiming a second and third. That was enough to give the Londoner the OSS title, just three points ahead of Craig Fleming.

The Alfashop Alfa Romeo competitors also turned out in force for their season finale and they had to contend with some horrendous conditions in what turned out to be the last race of the meeting, as the following Academy race was cancelled on safety grounds. Ian Stapleton, Alistair Kellett and Matt Daly emerged from the spray to claim the first three places. It was Stapleton’s second triumph of the day, having also won the morning race in his powerful GT V6. Bryan Shrubb and Anthony George followed Stapleton home in the somewhat drier earlier race.