Sports/GT
Monday's racing was for Sports/GT, the fastest class. This used a formant aimed at giving competitors experience for the World Championship meeting - with one minute qualifying to seed the races, and win from any of the 8x3min segmented finals. With 46 entries that meant the top two finals were for 7 drivers and the other 4 finals had a full 8 drivers. Practice was also unusual in giving competitors a run on every lane - 4 visits to the track and move to the next lane half way through.
Wink Hackman won best presented body with this body.
Qualifying got under way with 1 minute runs, the quickest qualifiers from the previous days running last, so (in theory) it should build up to the fastest runs at the end. Ross Grogan ran quite early, and was the first below 4.6 sec. Vince Lee beat that with 4.552 which lasted till Mark Harwood turned 4.480. Last to run was James Cleave who slotted in second with 4.525, leaving Mark top, the only driver under 4.5
In the F final Noddy Lockey built up a good lead, but was delayed with a pinion coming unsoldered, leaving Neil Grogan to win on 238. The E final was significantly quicker Stephen Siddall winning a close race with 253. Stephen's time was indeed quick enough to beat all the D finalists, somebody suggested D might stand for demolition! The C final consisted of several premier drivers including multiple champions Brian Saunders and Charlie Gooding. Charlie raised the bar to 268 with Keith Gibson second on 258. The B final looked really quick, but rather surprisingly it was not the premier grade drivers who were up front, Richard Mack lead a lot of the way but was overtaken at the end by Alan Lucas, Alan's 276 and Richard's 274 not only looked set to return them to the premier grade, but also set quite a challenge for the A finalists, as indeed did Paul Shepherd who was only a few feet behind Richard in third.
The A final turned into a great race, with Ross Grogan, James Cleave and Graham Woodward challenging for the lead. What was easy to miss up to 3/4 distance was that Ben Woodward had run on white and red lanes first. Ben was not far behind and was to finish on two of the quickest lanes. At the end of segment 7 we had Ross, James and both Woodwards on the same lap. With Graham heading for red lane it looked like a 3 man race although some had also spotted that the pace was only very slightly ahead of Alan's B final time so there was no guarantee the winner would come from the A final. It came down to a two man race, and Ben pulled out about half a lap lead on James for a win that nobody would have predicted a few hours earlier. Alan's B final time was good for third overall, just ahead of Ross who had too many offs in the final segment.
The A finalists Ben Woodward, Greg Harwood, Vince Lee, Graham Woodward, Mark Harwood, Ross Grogan and James Cleave
Below - Ben's winning car and (well used) body
| Driver | Qual time | Qual position | Laps | Main grade | |
| 1 | Ben Woodward | 4.746 | 7 | 278.03 | * |
| 2 | James Cleave | 4.525 | 2 | 277.56 | |
| 3 | Alan Lucas | 4.811 | 14 | 276.67 | 1 |
| 4 | Ross Grogan | 4.599 | 4 | 276.30 | |
| 5 | Richard Mack | 4.767 | 11 | 274.41 | 2 |
| 6 | Paul Shepherd | 4.757 | 9 | 274.34 | |
| 7 | Graham Woodward | 4.743 | 6 | 271.91 | |
| 8 | Paul Harwood | 4.773 | 13 | 269.30 | |
| 9 | Charlie Gooding | 4.839 | 17 | 268.16 | |
| 10 | Mark Harwood | 4.480 | 1 | 267.59 | |
| 11 | Greg Harwood | 4.719 | 5 | 264.12 | |
| 12 | Keith Gibson | 4.892 | 21 | 258.63 | |
| 13 | Vince Lee | 4.552 | 3 | 256.96 | |
| 14 | Dave Coward | 4.813 | 15 | 255.68 | |
| 15 | Stephen Siddall | 5.332 | 38 | 253.69 | 3 |
| 16 | Pat Skene | 4.767 | 11 | 252.67 | 4 |
| 17 | Steve Sargent | 4.827 | 16 | 251.92 | |
| 18 | Franz Barillaro | 5.126 | 31 | 248.27 | 5 |
| 19 | John Ovens | 5.182 | 33 | 248.18 | 6 |
| 20 | Wink Hackman | 5.114 | 30 | 247.57 | 7 |
| 21 | Chris Frost | 5.246 | 36 | 247.46 | 8 |
| 22 | Ian Fisher | 4.848 | 19 | 247.42 | |
| 23 | Ian Barker | 5.205 | 34 | 246.38 | 9 |
| 24 | Sandy Parker | 4.987 | 23 | 243.52 | 10 |
| 25 | David Sargent | 5.055 | 28 | 243.12 | 11 |
| 26 | Martin Ellis | 5.038 | 27 | 238.58 | 12 |
| 27 | Neil Grogan | 5.427 | 41 | 238.44 | 13 |
| 28 | Brian Saunders | 4.847 | 18 | 236.00 | |
| 29 | Rob Harris | 5.261 | 37 | 234.15 | 14 |
| 30 | Kev Gray | 5.030 | 25 | 233.57 | 15 |
| 31 | Trevor Crout | 5.031 | 26 | 231.94 | 16 |
| 32 | Colin Jackson | 5.717 | 44 | 224.37 | 17 |
| 33 | Keith Charles | 5.512 | 43 | 215.69 | 18 |
| 34 | Noddy Lockey | 5.421 | 40 | 214.67 | 19 |
| 35 | Bob Hallums | 10.000 | 46 | 214.40 | 20 |
| 36 | Mike Gibbon | 5.242 | 35 | 209.92 | 21 |
| 37 | Paul Austin | 4.965 | 22 | 203.11 | 22 |
| 38 | Mike Crofts | 5.176 | 32 | 203.00 | |
| 39 | George Kimber | 4.868 | 20 | 199.00 | |
| 40 | Dave Harvey | 4.762 | 10 | 172.00 | |
| 41 | James Davey | 5.867 | 45 | 163.00 | 23 |
| 42 | Michael Ovens | 4.748 | 8 | 149.00 | 24 |
| 43 | Mike Harrison | 5.101 | 29 | 146.00 | 25 |
| 44 | Mick Thomson | 5.446 | 42 | 129.00 | 26 |
| 45 | Chris Musto | 5.408 | 39 | 89.00 | 27 |
| 46 | Ernest Danyi | 5.010 | 24 | 85.00 | 28 |
* Overall champion not eligible for main grade trophy
Copyright © 2008 British Slot Car Racing Association - photographs copyright Chris Frost All rights reserved