BRSCC DELIGHTS AT CADWELL AS TITLE BATTLES TIGHTEN UP
- Nankang Tyre BMW Compact Cup
- Vinyl Detail Fiesta ST150 Challenge
- Clapham North MOT Mazda MX-5 SuperCup
- GAZ Shocks Mazda MX-5 Championship
- BRSCC Fiesta Junior Championship
- AIRTEC Motorsport Fiesta ST240 Championship
- Nankang Tyre CityCar Cup Championship
- Downforce Radio Mazda MX-5 Clubman Championship
- Modified Ford Series
Racing at Cadwell Park always produces a fine spectacle regardless of the content on the timetable, and the BRSCC’s recent visit to Lincolnshire for 2022 certainly delivered plenty spectacular action. While it wasn’t without a couple of spills, they were outweighed by all of the thrills provided by Mazdas, BMWs, Fords and CityCars, all of which were in fine from across the two days.
MAZDA MX-5 CHAMPIONSHIP
The Mazda MX-5 Championship ventured to Cadwell Park with championship with points leader Fraser Fenwick still firmly in command at the head of the table, but with the second half of the season beginning to progress quickly and dropped scores now starting to become a factor, now more than ever it was clear that every single point had to count. Fraser managed to put in a qualifying effort to place him on the front row once again, but not on pole position – that accolade would go to Steve Foden who looked in particularly good form around Cadwell Park’s near endless twists and turns.
Foden made the most of his front row start to beat Fenwick to Coppice for the first time in Race 1, while a fast starting Seb Fisher moved from the third row to P3 in the opening moments. Immediately the top two went into combat which set off a brief chain reaction that saw Foden, Fenwick and Fisher head three wide into the Gooseneck on Lap 2, helping Fisher to slot into 2nd, Fenwick take the lead and Foden shuffled to 3rd. Fenwick tried his best to pull away but had Fisher chasing after him for company, while Foden and Pullen conducted their own private battle for the final podium spot. Despite staying less than a second behind him on his tail, Fisher had to make do with 2nd as Fenwick took another race win, while Pullen took advantage of engine issues for Foden to complete the podium in 3rd.
Picking up where he left off on Sunday, Fenwick led away beginning Race 2 followed by Fisher and Foden, the latter running in a fresh engine after changing it overnight. Both managed to squeeze past the points leader at Park Corner beginning Lap 2, but Fenwick’s retaliation on Foden moments later only allowed Fisher to try and break away. Foden brilliantly passed Fisher for the lead around the outside with Fenwick following him through, and from here Seb just didn’t have the outright pace to keep up with either of them. Foden led Fenwick for the rest of the encounter, putting Rob Boston’s Racing’s hard work to good use as he claimed P1 ahead of Fenwick, with Fisher a distant third a few seconds back.
Both race winners were again side by side in the opening corners of Race 3 with Fisher also thrusting himself into contention early doors, and more side-by-side antics allowed Fenwick to take the lead outside of Chris Curve once again. Foden’s attempt to retaliate a lap later only cost him 2nd to Fisher, who then began to steadily eat away at Fenwick’s early lead gap, slipping past into the lead at half distance as Foden took to the grass at the Gooseneck. Eventually the top six were nose to tail in the final minutes with Foden trying to creep up the order and only rose as high as 4th, but in front, Fisher held back a last-minute attack from Fenwick to take his first win of 2022, while Seb’s teammate Oliver Graham took a brilliant P3 behind the championship leader.
MAZDA MX-5 CLUBMAN CHAMPIONSHIP
Declan McDonnell was hoping for another competitive weekend in the Mazda MX-5 Clubman Championship at Cadwell Park, however his qualifying efforts were only enough to place him 7th on the grid for the first race of the day. Ahead of him came Chris Dawkins and Harry Storer on the front row and fellow championship rival Matthew Fletcher in P3 despite an accident in qualifying causing his MX-5 to look less than pristine when lining up on the grid, sans a windscreen! Declan would certainly have work to do from row four.
While Dawkins made the most of pole position to get to Coppice first in Race 1 before Storer, behind them the fortunes of McDonnell took a nosedive when a tag from behind exiting Charlies sent him spinning onto the grass and down to the back of the field. Dawkins already had a 1.4-second lead at the end of Lap 1 and this only increased over the next few laps, eventually stretching out to over four seconds by the chequered flag for his third win of the season. The leaders had to survive a bizarre last-minute rain shower on the final lap with Storer catching a slide at The Mountain to remain 2nd, while Matthew Fletcher bounced back from a crash in qualifying to win a three-car fight for 3rd. Points leader McDonnell was only able to recover to 13th.
Storer and Dawkins were level peggings at the start of Race 2 and a little rub of panels between them allowed Storer to get into the lead and Pethick to briefly take 2nd from Dawkins, before Chris took it back into Park Corner. A lap later and Dawkins was back in front and with Pethick still chasing both in 3rd, the top three looked to settle down out in front. Chris was lucky to survive a slide off the road at Hall Bends early on, leading to Storer slingshotting past into the lead down the pit straight at half distance. Harry then made a mistake himself exiting Mansfield, eventually leading to Dawkins squeezing the #1 out at Park Corner to reclaim P1 and from here, it was calm and composed driving to give Chris his second win of the day from Storer, with Pethick his 5th podium of the season. Declan McDonnell’s 10th place would again quickly become one of his current worst races of the season, leaving him still in the championship lead but only by six points on dropped scores ahead of Storer and Matthew Fletcher.
MAZDA MX-5 SUPERCUP
The ultra-competitive Mazda MX-5 SuperCup touched down at Cadwell Park with the landscape at the top of the points table in the Pro Class looking a touch different. Long time leader Richard Amos was now on the back foot after a double DNF at Oulton Park, leaving him with the task of rebuilding his momentum this time around. He would have to do so from 3rd on the grid for Race 1, though, as Patrick Fletcher and Will Blackwell-Chambers lined up ahead of him.
After watching the front row pair run side by side for the opening three corners, Amos squeezed past both Knibbs and Blackwell-Chambers to grab the lead after just half a lap, although the seething mob on his tail had no intentions of letting him escape. A five-car fight for the lead quickly developed between the aforementioned trio plus Colin Bysouth and Patrick Fletcher and before long, Bysouth had worked his way onto Amos’ tail at half distance. Soon enough, he was back to 4th with Knibbs taking up P2 who found Amos putting up a rather robust and stubborn defence, but eventually Richard cracked and slid wide at Charlies to fall to 6th. The top three ended up bunched together at the line, with Knibbs collecting win #2 of the year with Blackwell-Chambers in 2nd and Bysouth in 3rd.
Blackwell-Chambers took the lead beginning Race 2 and in a much calmer affair than Race 1 had been at times, the same three drivers that had been on the podium the day before were again the class of the field. Despite both Blackwell-Chambers and Bysouth both taking to the grass exiting Charlies not long after the halfway point, there were no major dramas for any of the front runners and Blackwell-Chambers managed to defend from a last gasp attack from Bysouth on the final lap to win his second MX-5 SuperCup win on the road, with both ahead of Knibbs in P3.
The reverse grid draw put outgoing CityCar Cup champion Nic Grindrod onto pole for Race 3 and a chance at his first SuperCup race win, alongside Tom Seldon on the front row. Grindrod instantly took the lead but found Amos immediately latched onto his tail with the three double podium finishers also in tow behind. That was until Amos ran wide again at Charlies and tumbled down the order, leaving Bysouth to relieve Grindrod of the lead after a couple of laps. Blackwell-Chambers and Knibbs followed suit shortly after, and sure enough the three cars were together again out front. Remaining nose to tail until the end, it was Bysouth’s turn to take to the top step this time, heading Knibbs and WB-C at the flag to ensure their podium lockout.
The Club class saw a pair of wins for Simon Fleet in Races 1 and 2 before Scott Wright led a Paddock Motorsport 1-2-3 in class in the third race, with Kevin Brent, Bruce Robinson and guest driver Louis Smithen all sharing podium silverware between them. Nic Grindrod was also a clear winner in the Masters category all weekend, with Martin Tolley, Simon Fleet, Nick Rutter and Clapham North MOT’s George Grant all taking their share of Masters podiums.
AIRTEC MOTORSPORT FIESTA CHAMPIONSHIP
Going to Cadwell Park, the battle at the head of the AIRTEC Motorsport Fiesta Championship table was now becoming a two-horse race between ST240 class runners Jenson Brickley and Alastair Kellett – the outgoing Fiesta Junior champion versus the former outright Fiesta champ back in 2016. Fresh off the back of both drivers claiming a win each at Snetterton, momentum was strong for each but neither would start on the front row for Race 1, as that was taken up by pole man Zachary Lucas and defending champion Rob Smith.
Smith did well to get the better of Lucas straight away and with him proceeded to spreadeagle the rest of the field through the opening race of the weekend. Rob’s grip on the lead only slipped when he ran slightly wide heading up The Mountain, allowing Lucas to pull alongside and force Smith to give up the place approaching Hall Bends. A turn of speed from Kellett also put him onto their tails as well, but Lucas’ move proved to be well timed as just a couple of minutes later, the safety car was called for Adam Burdis’ ST150 off in tyres at Mansfield. The lengthy full course caution meant there was just one lap left on the restart, allowing Lucas to escape and claim victory from Smith and Kellett.
Lucas picked up where he’d left off to lead the start of Race 2 with Kellett quickly slotting past Smith for 2nd, but this came to nothing when the red flag was thrown after Marlo Cordell and John Cooper came together through Chris Curve. The restart happened to be a blessing for Smith as he nailed it this time and took the lead as he had done the day before – only this time, he wasn’t going to be headed. Lucas, Kellett and Brickley all kept up their pursuits but ultimately didn’t have the pace and Kellett himself dropped back later in the race and off the podium. Taking full advantage, Brickley pursued and passed Lucas when he dropped a wheel out wide at Chris Curve and slid sideways, giving Jenson a free pass to P2 and more crucial championship points. As for Rob Smith, he enjoyed a trouble-free run to claim his first win of the year as defending champion, from Brickley and Lucas on the podium behind him.
From the partially reversed grid for Race 3, Simon Horrobin beat pole man Dylan Hotchin off the lin and was quickly joined by Spencer Stevenson, before the pair made contact at Park Corner just moments later and gave the fast-starting Lucas a free pass to the lead. With Marco Ricci also getting tangled up in his own incident, the safety car was called again and after being neutralised for some nine minutes, racing resumed once again now deep into its second half. All four of the weekend’s ST240 podium finishers found themselves together and apart from pressure from Brickley on the leader, there was no change between them. Lucas claimed his second win of the weekend from Brickley in 2nd, Kellett in 3rd and Smith settling for 4th.
Honours in the ST150 class were split between Nick Moore and Joseph Knight, with the latter taking the class in Saturday’s race, while the former would do the job in both of Sunday’s encounters. Thomas Davis was also a constant all weekend with a hat-trick of 3rd place finishes too.
BRSCC FIESTA JUNIOR CHAMPIONSHIP
With his dad Rob managing to claim a victory in the senior ranks, Sid Smith was aiming to emulate him in the BRSCC Fiesta Junior Championship at Cadwell Park and had three opportunities to do so, with a third race being added to the timetable to replace that which had been lost at Oulton Park earlier in the season. With Race Car Consultants teammates Thomas Jack Lee and Albert Webster also in good form, it wasn’t going to be plain sailing for Sid.
Racing had barely even started when several cars came together in an incident at Coppice, leading to the race’s suspension and restart a few minutes later. Thankfully all but one of the cars involved were able to be patched up, repaired and lined up on the grid for the remaining two races later that day. On the second attempt, Smith managed to grab the lead from Webster off the line, but soon enough it became a four-car fracas also involving Lee and Ben Mulryan. Sadly this would be broken up when Webster lost control approaching Mansfield and clattered into the side of teammate Lee, putting both out on the spot. This left Smith to run trouble-free to the flag, claiming the win ahead of Mulryan in 2nd and JamSport Scholarship winner Lucas Hayden with a first podium in 3rd.
With 13 of the 14 car entry able to line up for Race 2 after a mega effort by the teams to repair damaged cars, Smith did the same as he had in Race 1 and leaped away from pole into the lead from the off, with Lee and Webster firmly in tow. Immediately they began pressuring the JamSport driver but soon enough Smith was able to start creating a gap while the RCC teammates (including Mulryan in this group) battled with each other. Webster and Lee enjoyed a brilliant battle for P2 in the final minutes, including a last lap duel that saw them side by side from Mansfield all the way to the exit of the Hall Bends in a wonderful display of junior racing! Lee came out on top ahead of Webster while Smith ran away to a comfortable win to further extend his championship lead.
Then came the replacement race taking the place of the lost round from Oulton Park, with the grid set by the result of Race 2 earlier in the afternoon. Another strong start for Smith saw him yet again lead into Coppice, but a rocket-propelled Dan Lewis immediately charged up to 2nd in the car that had been the main casualty of the Race 1 shunt earlier in the morning. He took up the mantle of Sid’s main challenger for this race and pursued him all the way throughout, looking likely to make an attack on a couple of occasions. However, in the cruellest turn of fortunes, Lewis approached The Mountain on the final lap only for his right front wheel to part company and immediately put him out on the spot, just corners away from his best FJC result to date.
Smith completed his hat-trick moments later, while Webster and Lee were a surprised 2nd and 3rd, while Lewis was still given his own plaudits with the Driver of the Day award. Additionally, in an incredible sporting gesture, Webster chose to give Lewis his 2nd place trophy too, acknowledging that it had been Dan’s position to lose up until those final moments. Proof that the Fiesta Junior paddock is both ultra-competitive and yet also ultra-supportive of each other in equal measure!
NANKANG TYRE BMW COMPACT CUP
The name on everyone’s lips so far in the Nankang Tyre BMW Compact Cup is still Mikey Doble, as his near complete domination of the championship in 2022 has seen him be the man to be by far provided all is well with the car. Despite mechanical gremlins at Anglesey, he rebounded at Oulton Park with a pair of wins and now headed to Cadwell Park to try and continue this run of form.
Incredibly, it wasn’t Mikey that started Race 1 on Saturday from pole position, as Matt Flowers would instead take his first career Compact Cup pole in qualifying. However, even that couldn’t stop Doble from flying off the line and immediately grabbing the lead on the race start, quickly joined by Anglesey winner Guy Davis in 2nd with Flowers down to P3. Davis was determined not to let Doble have it his own way and the top two quickly left Flowers and Dendy-Sadler behind to fight over 3rd. Early in the second part of the race, Doble had to start defending Davis’ advances but had enough in reserve to keep him at bay and claim his 8th win of the season, both ahead of Flowers with an excellent 3rd place to compliment his pole position.
It wasn’t the same story in Race 2 as this time Davis got the better of Doble to lead from the outset and managed to pull a 1.4 second gap in just three laps over the championship leader. Guy seemed to have an answer to any lap time that Mikey tried to throw at him and by the time the chequered flag came around, Davis had added another second to his gap. In a rare occurrence, Doble just didn’t seem to have a response and it allowed Davis to clinch his fourth win of the year to add to his Anglesey hat-trick. Ian Howes won a race-long scrap between the next five cars or so to take the final step on the podium, while Mike Doble Snr was top Masters driver across the weekend, finishing top of that category twice.
NANKANG TYRE CITYCAR CUP
Sunday would prove to be a busy day all round for the Nankang Tyre CityCar Cup as they would contest three races over the course of the timetable of events. Alongside their originally scheduled pair, a third race was also added to act as a substitute for the one lost at the previous meeting at Snetterton. There was still a championship fight to resolve both in the main points table and in the Student Motorsport Challenge, with the top four in the overall standings on the first two rows together for Race 1.
Elliot Lettis, Andrew Dyer and the Bliss brothers Richard & Stuart owned P1 to P4 on the grid with Lettis on pole and after taking Coppice side by side, Lettis managed to hold station in the lead while the Blisses were split by a fast starting Andy Burgess in the East Surrey College car to complete the opening lap in 4th. Lettis, Dyer and Richard Bliss ended up in a race of their own out in front, several seconds ahead of the next group of cars battling over 4th headed by Burgess.
Late in the race, both Lettis and Burgess dropped to the rear of their respective groups, allowing Dyer to move into the lead and indeed take the race win ahead of Richard Bliss with Lettis in 3rd. As for Burgess, he dropped to 8th and behind the Student Motorsport winner Ben Creanor, who captured the first SMC win for Oxford Brookes while Richard Jepp claimed 3rd for MET Motorsport.
Dyer’s win gave him pole for Race 2, which he held off the start and converted to the lead instantly, but moments into the start and Elliot Lettis’ world turned upside down – literally! He ended up rolling out of the race exiting the Gooseneck, forcing the safety car to be scrambled and holding the field in status for several minutes. There were just over 3 minutes left when racing did get underway, with Dyer still able to hold the lead despite attention from both of the Bliss Toyota Aygos. Neither could unseat him as Dyer took his second win of the weekend, while Richard finished ahead of Stuart in a Bliss 2-3 and Andy Burgess won another Student Motorsport Challenge contest for East Surrey College, ahead of Ben Creanor for Oxford Brookes and Richard Jepp once again for MET Motorsport.
Lettis’ roll over left his car too damaged to run in Race 3, the replacement race for that lost at Snetterton in the previous round, with a partially reversed grid to boot. This put Christopher Mackenzie alongside Andy Burgess courtesy of the draw. Burgess managed to capture the lead in the first few corners and did a grand job to hold on for two and half laps before Stuart Bliss found a gap to squeeze through.
Dyer found a way past too, but moments later fluid down at Hall Bends caught a handful of cars out and brought about another safety car appearance. Despite the timer ticking down to zero, the field was allowed one extra racing lap, which seemed to catch out Dyer, Burgess and Richard Bliss on the restart. Liam Browning, by contrast, got a stellar jump on all three and leapt from 5th to 2nd in one move, whilst Stuart Bliss left them all for dust and charged to his second win of the year. Richard Bliss settled for P3 behind Browning, who was delighted with his first podium of the season. Once again, Andy Burgess took another SMC victory for East Surrey College, while Ben Creanor survived a late trip across the grass to claim P2 for Oxford Brookes, again ahead of Richard Jepp for MET Motorsport.
VINYL DETAIL ST-XR CHALLENGE
Always a circuit that proves to provide exceptional racing for the championship, the Vinyl Detail ST-XR Challenge has become another favourite venue for competing drivers, and it was another chance for points leader Michael Blackburn to further extend his lead at the head of the standings. However, while the usual names such as Chris Grimes, Sam Beckett, Matt Pimlott and Mark Blunt were all out in force again, none of them proved to Mike’s immediate main challenger.
That turned out to be Simon Robinson in one of the two sole surviving Fiesta XR2s, with an incredible lap in qualifying to start on the front row alongside Blackburn on pole. Blackburn did initially look as though he had a shot at the lead with an excellent start, but both Blackburn and Pimlott pushed him back to third, before a mistake by Mike at the Hairpin gave Pimlott a small gap out in front. Robinson retaliated by taking back P2 and then hounding Pimlott for the lead, but ended up losing his place back to Blackburn in the final minutes, before Mike attacked for the lead on the final lap but to no avail. Pimlott held on to claim his first win of the season with Blackburn and Robinson latched onto his bumper at the line.
Blackburn took his turn out in front with Pimlott on his bumper from the outset, while Robinson decided to take a watching brief back in 3rd. Once in the lead, it ended up being a rather drama-free race for Blackburn, keeping Pimlott at arm’s length for the majority of the 15 minutes, but Matt did try and attack heading onto the final lap but with no move forthcoming, reversing the top two finishing order from Race 1 as Blackburn stood on the top step again. Robinson once more picked up P3 overall in another impressive effort from the XR2.
Despite a small incident deep in the field at Coppice, the start of Race 3 was somewhat trouble-free, as Pimlott headed the pack from a quick starting Sam Beckett. As the race ticked over, Blackburn also caught up and joined into the battle with Robinson in two too, bringing the top four together covered by less than a second. Beckett dived up the inside of Pimlott at Chris Curve, only to clip Pimlott, run deep and then move straight into Blackburn’s path as recovered, damaging Blackburn’s left front in the process and putting him out. Through all of this, Robinson slipped by all three ST150s to snatch the lead and it looked as though he was on course for the first outright XR win of the season, but Pimlott’s late charge put him on Simon’s bumper starting the last lap. Both cars tangled on Park straight, sending Robinson spearing across the grass and dropping to 4th, but shot up the inside of Blunt with two corners to go to reclaim 3rd. Pimlott took the win in the end from Beckett and an aggrieved Robinson wound up P3. Pimlott was initially given a time penalty, but successfully appealed it to reinstate his victory.
MODIFIED FORD SERIES
Again out in force to entertain both trackside spectators and live stream viewers alike, the Modified Ford Series turned out at Cadwell Park with another excellent mix of models on display as per usual. Qualifying put Paul Nevill’s Ford Escort Mk2 RS2000 on pole alongside the Sierra Sapphire Cosworth of Gary Wait – but come the start of Race 1, one of these cars would end up playing an unintentional role in what was about to happen next…
When the lights went out to get the first race underway, Nevill’s car accelerated as normal, but Wait’s Sierra seemed to hesitate and remain at its rolling start speed, catching out everyone else behind who had to check up to try and avoid an accident. Unfortunately two cars that couldn’t escape an accident were Tony Paxman’s Escort Mk1 and Alex Boam’s Fiesta ST, the latter nosing hard into the outside barrier on the pit straight. The incident ended up taking more than 40 minutes to clear due to Alex requiring medical attention, and while he was taken to hospital after the accident, he was discharged the next morning.
Once the race was able to get underway for the full 15 minutes despite the lack of time remaining before the circuit curfew (special dispensation was allowed for the race to run in its entirety), both front row cars got underway sucessfully, as did Jack Gadd who immediately challenged Wait for 2nd in his Mk1 Escort RSR. With Malcolm Harding’s Mk2 Escort Zakspeed and Rory Jose’s thunderous pink Ford Focus also moving up, there came a wonderful five car symphony of noise and power up front. Both Gadd and Harding passed Wait to move into the podium places, but neither of them had the extra required to unseat Nevill from the lead. The race was flagged early due to Wait’s Sierra expiring just before The Mountain, giving Nevill the win from Gadd and Harding.
Thankfully, Sunday’s race had a much less dramatic start with Gadd getting the jump on Nevill from the front row before Harding followed him past corners later. However, while the front runners tried to make hay while they could, behind them the man on the charge was the ever dominant Escort Cosworth of Dave Cockell, who had to sacrifice running on Saturday to ensure his car was race ready for Sunday. Incredibly from the back of the grid, Cockell made light work of the cars in front of him to charge up to 6th in just two laps, before passing Lloyd Jamieson’s own Escort Cosworth for P5 and then setting off after the top four of Nevill, Gadd, Harding and Jose.
With six minutes left, Cockell began his charge and steadily picked off each of the cars ahead of him, ending up with a pass for the lead on Nevill exiting Charlies. From here, Cockell was off into the distance and reeled off the last couple of laps to notch up another Modified Ford win for 2022. Nevill held on to claim 2nd place overall this time, while Gadd settled for 3rd place in the end, ahead of Jose and Harding.
Scott Woodwiss
