Smeatharpe Stadium - Easter Monday 1st April 2013

Report by Steve Linfield

After the freezing cold of Pr1mo International and St Day over the Easter break, it stepped up a gear at Smeatharpe on Easter Monday with an absolutely arctic wind blowing across the stadium and those race goers who did brave the elements did very well.  But, at least it was dry once again and they were rewarded with a fine showing from the BriSCA F2 Stock Cars, Saloon Stock Cars and Bangers with entries holding up well despite it being at the end of the hectic long weekend.

BriSCA F2 Stock Cars

There were a few who failed to go no further than practice in the BriSCA F2’s but this still left 39 cars to race, which included drivers from almost all four corners of the country including a track debut for Scotsman 102 Willie Draeger.  886 Chris Bradbury held off a late challenge from 768 Tom Adcroft to take heat one and 991 Ryan Hoskin took his first win of 2013 in heat two.  Several tripped up and over each other in the consolation who would have otherwise been considered certain qualifiers.  This left several others to handily pick up the pieces and be able to compete in their first qualifiers only Final and also score their maiden national point.  It was 575 Tom Clark who did more than that and scored his maiden BriSCA F2 win.   The Final got off to a bit of a chaotic start when some of the yellow and blue graded drivers hooked, tangled and spun.  This did allow the white tops to get away a bit more and by the same token delayed the charge of the stars slightly.  950 Lewis Holden headed most of the first half of the race, losing out to Clark and then regaining the lead when he retired.  However, Bradbury was looming large by then and took over soon after and went on to take the victory, which was his second heat and Final double of the weekend having done the same at Bristol the previous afternoon.  Adcroft, in his fifth meeting of the weekend kept him honest and 700 Adam Rubery was third, on his return from his large crash two weeks previous.  The Grand National saw 783 James Rygor take the win with Bradbury making it up to fifth place to round out another fast and furious display from the F2’s.

Saloon Stock Cars

The Saloon Stock Car entry as expected swelled from St Day to be up to 23 cars, including the Scottish visitors and those who’d been in Cornwall a day earlier.   There was an excellent race for second in heat one but it was a little way behind leader and race winner 611 Adam Low.  He then followed it up with more of the same in heat two, which was a race that featured a quick but never the less brutal skirmish between the big guns of 1 Eddie Darby, 402 Shaun Webster and 618 Stuart Shevill.  It was the latter that came off the worst with a hefty trip into the plating and whether we have seen the last of this one remains to be seen.   It was not to come in the Final which was however another hard and fast race with bumpers going in hard and places swapping and changing.  Low never really got into his stride this time and it was 911 Ian Harris who took some catching.  257 Timmy Aldridge did, but just as he went to pounce 30 Barry Hollett did the same on them both and it was this move that allowed him to get away and go on to take the win.   Darby made it through to second and 56 Georgie Boult, who can look back on a successful Easter weekend in third.

Bangers

No less than 63 Bangers were present, several of whom had raced at St Day on Sunday.  With the new policy for 2013 of having more cars in the heats, there were two rather than the previous standard of three.  This worked well and after a couple of yellow flags 133 Jody Jeanes took heat one and heat two saw a four car battle for the lead, that was only resolved in 438 Dan Rice’s favour right on the last lap.  The consolation saw 83 Ben Styles take the lead with two laps to run to take the win.  The annual Easter Hop trophy was led early on by 416 Ben Borthwick and he continued to do so until the halfway mark when 45 Mike Read took over.  However, he was tipped out of it and then the battling duo of 372 Jay Matthews and 438 Rice hit the front.  It was Matthews who got to the flag first ahead of Rice with 916 Luke Thomas making third.   As has become the norm on Easter Monday now, the last event for the Bangers was the Chained Pairs.   Most of the field managed to fail to negotiate the first lap and when it sorted itself out it was the 2012 winners of 246 Ryan and 247 Richard Sparks who took the lead and once again looked the strongest of them all.  However, this all changed when Ryan’s car appeared to run sick and Richard was effectively pushing him around.  This caused them to slow significantly and when they came to lap the pair of 154 Barry Pike and 194 Alastair Buchan they spun them.  This allowed the pair of 654 Mark Pope and 87 Paul Lawer to take over and they went on to win.

BriSCA F2 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th
Heat 1 886 768 921 352 783 605 126 596 254 830
Heat 2 991 464 676 700 167 797 189 116 302 627
Consolation 575 890 102 544 935 950 156 613 529 519
Final 886 768 700 783 921 991 189 605 352 167
Grand National 783 352 676 700 886 189 167 921 315 768
Grade Awards W 575 Y 991 B 783
Saloon Stock Cars 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th
Heat 1 611 56 402 315 2 1 257 207 158 120
Heat 2 611 120 199 257 207 20 995 56 100 402
Final 30 1 56 120 103 207 315 314 257 911
Bangers 1st 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th
Heat 1 133 70 816 916 194 247 451 881 333 134
Heat 2 438 929 45 372 141 186 910 475 999 113
Consolation 83 654 735 246 242 154 100 938 416 556
Final 372 438 916 194 247 246 475 416 910 242
Chained Pairs 87/654 183/153 246/247 154/194 nof
Best Presented 100 475 715
Grade Awards W 70, 416, 920 Y 438, 654, 816 B 929, 735, 154 R 372, 916, 194
  • DSC_2548
  • DSC_2594
  • DSC_2595
  • DSC_2610
  • DSC_2629
  • DSC_2642
  • DSC_2696
  • DSC_2709
  • DSC_2746
  • DSC_2784
  • DSC_2792
  • DSC_2853
  • DSC_2875
  • DSC_2917
  • DSC_2946
  • DSC_2951
  • DSC_2985
  • DSC_2996
  • DSC_3005
  • DSC_3067
  • DSC_3076
  • DSC_3105
  • DSC_3132
  • DSC_3141
  • DSC_3195
  • DSC_3281
  • DSC_3292
  • DSC_3314
  • DSC_3330
  • DSC_3413
  • DSC_3416
  • DSC_3424
  • DSC_3462
 

Site by Chris Frankum | Design by Andy Jackson

Powered by software developed by Nexus Open Software

Terrms and Conditions

© 2024 Autospeed. All Rights Reserved.