Round 3-  21/22 June  -  DOWTY

Club web site

A warm summers day and hot racing - what more can you want?

Thanks to Dave and Rob for running an excellent meeting, and a special thanks to Ross for all that marshalling.  Also a big thank you to meeting sponsors SCD.

The racing was  two 3 minute qualifying heats, best run to seed the segmented finals, win from any final. With 15 entrants, these were split up with 3 in the A final and the rest in groups of 4.

Racing kicked off with saloon. The top qualifier was (not unexpectedly) James Cleave, rather less expectedly he was joined in the top 3 by two main grade drivers - Chris Aldridge and Stan Alton.  Before racing started Stan told me he’ wasn’t expecting any special results, he’d really only come as chauffeur for  James.

Vince Lee was leading from  Paul Shepherd going into the A final.   James won the A final followed by his chauffeur.  Stan’s second overall put him top of main grade, followed by Chris who was 5th overall behind Vince and Shep.


Below - the winning chassis and the Saloon A finalists



© Copyright British Slot Car Racing Association  2014. Photos copyright C.Frost All rights reserved

1/32 BOC 2014   British Open Championship

Saloon


F1


Sports

1

James Cleave

104.39


1

James Cleave

105.47


1

James Cleave

120.67

2

Stan Alton

101.74


2

Paul Shepherd

102.76


2

Vince Lee

119.35

3

Vince Lee

100.37


3

Vince Lee

95.66


3

Stan Alton

117.54

4

Paul Shepherd

100.22


4

Ian Barker

95.08


4

Paul Shepherd

113.94

5

Chris Aldridge

99.59


5

Chris Aldridge

94.66


5

Ian Barker

112.66

6

Gordon Dickson

99.26


6

Steve Sargent

93.79


6

Ben Woodward

111.13

7

Ian Barker

97.70


7

Ant Hawkes

93.27


7

Steve Sargent

108.95

8

Graham Woodward

97.50


8

Gordon Dickson

92.52


8

Graham Woodward

108.24

9

David Sargent

96.94


9

Ben Woodward

91.39


9

Ant Hawkes

104.30

10

Steve Sargent

95.94


10

Andy Smith

90.38


10

Sam Smith

103.91

11

Ant Hawkes

94.74


11

David Sargent

88.14


11

Chris Aldridge

103.45

12

Andy Smith

94.12


12

Chris Frost

85.37


12

David Sargent

102.75

13

Ben Woodward

90.14


13

Sam Smith

80.14


13

Andy Smith

101.36

14

Sam Smith

89.34


14

Stan Alton

49


14

Chris Frost

101.04

15

Chris Frost

85.15


15

Graham Woodward

48


15

Gordon Dickson

75.95

F1

The top qualifier was again James Cleave, this time joined in the top 3 by the premier grade pairing of Paul Shepherd and Vince Lee.

Ian Barker qualified for the bottom final, feeling he’d rather overdriven the car in the heats, and could do a lot better if he drove it less aggressively.  It turns out he was right, his D  final winning time wasn’t beaten in the C or B leaving him top going into the A final.  The A final saw another 3 lap victory for James, with Shep taking second  7 laps ahead of Vince with Ian 4th overall.   Top main grade driver was Chris Aldridge with 5th overall.

Photos - the winning chassis and A final cars

Sports

James Cleave completed his top qualifying hat trick, Paul Shepherd and Stan Alton joined him in the top 3.

Sam Smith was enjoying his first taste of BOC racing, and scored an impressive 10 overall in sports.

Paul Shepherd, Ian Barker and Ben Woodward finished 1-2 - 3 in the B final to take the top 3 places going into the A.   

In the A final, it was Vince who made the best start, pulling out a lap’s lead in the first segment.   Vince led for 3 segments, although James was catching him.  Come the last segment, James had the lane advantage and took the lead while Vince had too many offs on blue.   So the best race of the day ended in a larger winning margin than looked likely.  Congratulations to James on wining all 3 classes, and to Vince for making such a good race of it. Stan took 3rd overall and top main grade spot ahead of the top B finalists.

A Final                                                                                       B Final

James Cleave       Vince Lee                       Stan Alton                    Paul Shepherd           Ian Barker    Ben Woodward  Ant Hawkes


Below, the winning chassis and a close up of the underside showing the repair to the broken frame rail (right of photo)

Rob Harrris presents the prizes
          James Cleave overall winner in all 3                           :         Stan Alton main grade winner in two classes          :            Sam Smith top clubman

The next round is at Luton in July.  Here’s looking forward to another excellent meeting.

Chris