Track and Race Cars Magazine Monoposto Championship Snetterton 17 October 2009 1600, Classic, Formula and 2000

Everything to play for?

Only the Formula championship was settled in favour of Graham Read. David Parkinson could only lose the 1600 championship if Tony Cotton won twice with fastest lap, and since Satan hadn't been seen buying snow shoes, most people's money was on Dave. The 2 2 litre classes were more debateable. If Nick Anstruther won twice with fastest lap, Russ Giles had to achieve 4th or better. The first was quite a strong possibility, but Russ lower than 4th would probably be dependant on bad luck. With Russ's bad luck at Snet in April, he must have felt nervous. As for the 2000 class, Jeremy Timms needed 2 wins and fastest laps to depose Neil Harrison, if Neil finished lower than second. Read on....

Qualifying

A packed grid of 26 cars means it's not possible to mention everybody. At the front, Jeremy had pole and Neil was 3rd, with Tristan Cliffe 2nd. Nick Anstruther and Richard Purcell led Classic, with championship leader Russ making sure he did just enough with 3rd. Nigel Smith had 1600 pole by 1.5 seconds from Geoff Fern, whilst David Parkinson followed Russ's lead and slotted in a cool, conservative 3rd. It was good to see a couple of F4 cars joining us, Mono returnee Steven Griffin (VD FX) and Jennifer Scott whom we last saw at Spa in a VD RF99 redolent of the fondly remembered JL/Comtec cars. Both, of course, ran 1800 Zetecs. Kevin Mason raced his F3 Dallara 399 in Formula, which I think makes him unique in racing his F3 car in Mono and his Mono car in F3. He's from Birmingham.

Race

As the lights went out, so did 10th place man Terry Clark's engine. The left hand side of the gird avoided him, though Tony Cotton, 10 places behind, stopped inches from the FVL's Hewland in a huge cloud of East European rubber smoke. Tony Cotton would like to apologise to Terry for any gestures he may have made at this point - it was a bit of excess adrenalin. The rear of the grid sorted itself out with no damage, though sadly Terry didn't make the finish, dropping out on lap 10.

Lap 2 was the apparently decisive lap for the front of the grid. Neil is one of our smoothest, most "technical" drivers (by which I mean he usually does things right). Whether it was just a bad day, or the pressure reached him, nobody can say, but he went for a rapid change into 4th, and got 2nd. The XE wasn't keen on this at all, as Mr Valve made an unseemly proposal of intimacy to Miss Piston who immediately responded by hitting him. Exit Neil, who after the race set back for Kidderminster, he and Nick impressing many with their stoic, sportsmanlike acceptance of apparent defeat.

Tristan also had issues on lap2 and spun his (still Silverstone shod, we think) F398, losing some time and places which promoted Nick Anstruther to overall second. Tristan fought back to 3rd. On lap 3, Jeremy Goodman, in his blue RT3 this week, left the race. Richard Purcell, at one point running third, came fourth followed by Kevin Mason's rapid and sleek 399. Russ Giles was 6th overall, but the 3rd in class clinched the seasonal trophy for the Redditch engineer. And with all this activity, what was going on at the front? Jeremy Timms was serenely finishing 33 seconds in the lead, lonely but with fastest lap. Job done for Saturday, looking good for Sunday.

In the 1600 class, Geoff Fern must have had something amazing for lunch because not a lap afer the first 2 was slower than qualifying and his best was 2 seconds below. Unsurprisingly, therefore, he truly took the fight to Nigel Smith, finishing less than a second behind him with fastest 1600 lap. Tony Cotton made up the places lost on the grid and attacked David Parkinson. The slippery FVJ took David's bewinged Reynard on the Revitt straight, into the esses, several times, only for David to use the extra stability around Coram and retake Tony into the chicane. Tony finished just ahead, with Henry Fryer next up, getting faster all the time.

I'm sorry if I've missed anybody's epic battle / personal best / major achievemnent. Unfortunately, driving in a race is a great way to report on a small part of it, but a useless way to report on the rest of the grid. If anybody has any tales, please email Startline.

With 2 more championship classes resolved in favour of messrs Giles and Parkinson, it was just the Blue Ribband to be decided on Sunday. To be continued.........

Tony Cotton

Pictures by Andrew Cliffe / Norwich Photo

Finger points to Terry Clark thinking "for goodness' sake, please start", or words to similar effect

Kevin Mason's very pretty 399

Stephen Griffin's VDFX4, ex Dermot, so ex-Tom Brown, ex-Alan Everitt, we assume

Classic Champion Russ Giles

DP is drowned in Champagne / Lidl Sparkling Wine-Style Alcohol Replicate