FUN CUP FIRES UP OLYMPIAN
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After two events run with other clubs, the BRSCC South Eastern Centre ran its first meeting of 2009 in its own right, with a two-day event on the Kent venue’s 1.199 mile Indy Circuit. As befits mid-June, the weekend stayed warm and dry.
Saturday’s action featured just five races, with four hours set aside for the Fun Cup UK. The Team Honeywell entry of Neil Plimmer and Geoff Fawcett led throughout, TDI diesel engined cars filling the top ten. Meanwhile, the Nightingale Racing entry of Stuart Ramsay, Peter Flynn and Michael Lockyer had teamed up for the day with Olympic double gold medallist Dame Kelly Holmes to support her Legacy Trust. Dame Kelly carried out the grid draw, joined in the grid walk, waved the Chequered Flag and presented trophies, including an award for third in the petrol-engined class for Nightingale Racing. Seemingly bitten by the motorsport bug on her first visit to a race meeting, Kelly expressed a desire to get behind the wheel, and it wouldn’t surprise your correspondent to see her out in a Ford Fiesta at some stage! Talking of which, Competition Car Insurance Ford Fiesta Championship competitors had a couple of outings on the Saturday, Class A and overall honours going to Horsham’s David Nye, with Lydd’s Scott Baines taking Class B in the combined race. The separate class C event saw a titanic battle between Ipswich’s David Ellesley and Nick Sanderson, victory going to the former. Nye made it a double in Sunday’s encounter, with Canterbury’s Lee Brett securing Class B. Woking man Sanderson gained revenge in the later rerun. . East Chinnock’s Gary Culver stroked his 355 Challenge to victory in the Pirelli Ferrari Open race, and repeated the feat later in the afternoon in his 328 GTB in the formula classic event. A clean sweep was thwarted by Martley’s David Tomlin in a similar mount in Sunday’s Open race, but the natural order was restored in the second formula classic event. A minute’s silence in memory of former marque owner and racer Peter Wheeler preceded the first Dunlop TVR Challenge race – one of 10 on the Sunday – claimed by Eynsford’s Michael Saunders’ Cerbera, the local man doubling up later in the day. The first Bernard Baxter Engineering/URS Classic Formula Ford Championship qualifier fell to Chingford’s Stuart Kestenbaum in his Van Diemen RF79, but runner-up Joe Walton from Bingley reversed the positions next time out in his Ray GRS05. URS Classic Formula Ford 2000 Championship laurels went to Lawrence Denne’s Van Diemen RF82 in the first outing. Didcot’s Ian Pearson’s RF83 edged ahead in the meeting’s closing event. On a weekend when some of our marshals and senior officials were otherwise occupied at meetings elsewhere in the UK and France, we were pleased to welcome back NW Centre’s Ken Tyrer to bolster our clerking team. The full results for the meeting can be found at: www.tsl-timing.com/brscc/2009/92432.pdf The next BRSCC South Eastern Centre race meeting is at Brands Hatch on August 15-16 for the BRSCC Clubmans Raceday. Colin Mann |
