The Saloon Car Championship

The week end’s racing started with the saloon class.

The first winner was Greg Harwood and his best presented car.

The drivers started with a 1 minute qualifying run, the best single lap to count for seeding them into 6 segmented heats.

James Cleave was the top qualifier with a 5.497 second lap followed by Ross Grogan was the top qualifier with a 5.592 and Graham Woodward on 5.694. Richard Mack was top in main grade on 5.911.

The race format for all three classes was segmented heats giving the drivers 3 minutes on each of the 8 lanes, all runs to count.  The 8 with the highest totals go into the final open to all grades of driver. The top 8 main grade divers who haven’t made the overall final go to a separate final to race for the main grade championship.   Both finals were 8 x 4 minutes.

Peter McKendrick won the first heat with 198 laps.   Paul Shepherd was in the second heat, having qualified out of place due to controller problems, he raised the bar to 222 well ahead of a close race for second between Keith Charles and Graham Thomas.  
Mike Davies won the third heat on 212.   Stan Alton took the fourth heat on 218 ahead of Richy Kettleson.  We had to wait to the penultimate heat for somebody to top Shep’s time, that somebody was Dave Harvey with 224. The final heat produced the of the fastest qualifiers, James Cleave (234) and Ross Grogan (225) took 1-2 while Graham Woodward took 4th spot just a few feet behind Dave’s B heat time.



© Copyright British Slot Car Racing Association 2016, photo copyright C.Frost 2016 All rights reserved

Full Results



1/32   Nationals   2016

The Final  

Ian Barker, James Cleave, Chris Thomas, Gavin Wills, Dave Harvey, Paul Shepherd Ross Grogan, Graham Woodward

James Cleave’s winning car

Main Grade Final

Stan Alton, Martin Ellis, Mick Davies, Richy Kettleson, David Sargent Chris Aldridge, Richard Mack, Nick Thrower

Richy’s Main Grade winning car

Main Grade final.

Richy Kettleson was only 4th fastest qualifier for the main grade final, but took the lead from the start with Chris Aldridge and David Sargent in close company for second and third.  Richy and Chris continued 1-2 through the rest of the race.  (Had Richy matched that pace in the heats he would have been well into the overall final.)  David had some trouble on black lane, but recovered to third for the rest of the race.  Top qualifier Stan Alton had a pit stop in the first segment which left him 8th,   then put in quick runs to move up to 4th in the final segment.

Overall final.

Top qualifier James Cleave took the lead in the first segment, even though he wasn’t on a quick lane.  (A lot of drivers prefer to start on the slower lanes and finish on the fast ones.)   Gavin Wills was in a close second at quarter distance, but once James was on the quicker lanes he  pulled away.  Ross Grogan also chose to start on two of the slower lanes, once those were behind him, he was the closest challenger to James although he was 7 laps in arrears by the end.   Graham Woodward  challenged for third later in the race, but had to settle for fourth  3 laps behind Gavin Ian Barker made a slow start on the un fancied red lane, but had a quick finish to take 5th just a lap behind Woody.