Round four of the Kent Cup took place at Buckmore Park on Sunday and with two visiting championships adding to the programme, some 160 drivers were destined to race throughout the day.

After the timed practice in the morning 27 races were next on the schedule, featuring a Heat – Pre-Final and then main Final for each competitor.

Glorious weather welcomed the first final of the afternoon for the Junior Max drivers. Charlie Lamb (Benfleet) led away for the first 3 laps, an early casualty was one of the favourites Charlie Bennett (Bromley) who had an electrical fault that forced him to pit.

By lap 4 Tyler Sullivan (Canvey Island) had worked his way into the lead, his pace and consistency proved just too much for Lamb to cope with. This was a real confidence booster for Sullivan after a recent run of poor luck at the challenging picturesque Kent circuit; which seemed to have shifted to his old rival Bennett for this event.

Behind Lamb in 2^nd place came Harry Gent (Latchingdon) who finished in front of the local driver Luke Wooder (Chatham) 4^th, with Maidstone’s Liam Carter 5^th from Ben Rawlinson (Hockley) in 6^th.

The young stars in the Honda Cadet class were up next and produced a classic tense Buckmore Park cadet final. At the front of the field Harrison Blake and Luke Whitehead (Sevenoaks) had the edge on the rest of the field; the Pre-Final had seen Whitehead taking the win from Blake by a scant 0.1 second with Sissinghurst’s Alfie Glenie 3^rd.

The main began as the previous final had with Blake heading Whitehead, while Glenie had been caught up in a first lap incident and dropped to the back. For 7 laps Project One’s Blake held Ambition racing’s Whitehead back, but on lap 8 it was time for Luke to make his move on Harrison, this he did successfully and he then managed to hold number 90 kart off to the flag. It wasn’t at all easy though as Blake pushed the number 13 kart hard, the two of them never more than a metre or two apart.

Out of the last corner Blake had a run on the outside of Whitehead only to find himself taking to the grass in spectacular style, he somehow still managed to cross the line side by side with his celebrating fellow competitor, a valiant effort.

Behind this action another tremendous and frantic battle of wits took place with Bradley Hardy (Erith) taking his best Buckmore Park result with a fine 3^rd place, his plain black kart beating Dylan Cooper (Uckfield), Owen Tolley (Ash), with Alfie Prince (Reigate) in 6^th.

The next of the Kent Cup finals was for the other Cadet drivers the Clubmans, who were mixed with the IAME karts for this weekend.

Alex Moody (Southampton) was on great form this month and that continued into the final as he held off a great challenge from a gallant Callum Gunning (Herne Bay) to win by 0.2 seconds, both celebrating with outstretched single arms as they crossed the line. Behind them Sebastian Bloch (Chiselhurst) charged up to third, Oliver Greenall (Dunmow) was caught up with some IAME drivers and finished 4^th, 5^th was Matthew Hyde (Sible Headingham) and Mika Renzullo was top novice in 6^th.

Rashan Chigorimbo (London) fared better than last month when he was involved in a last lap crash, to win the IAME class from Samuel Shaw (Fareham), Toby McDonald was 3^rd from Alex keens (Liphook) in 4^th, the top six were rounded out by Charlie Typaldo-Cole (Biggin Hill) and Joshua Rowledge (Wimborne).

The Mini Max class was a straightforward affair once Ronnie Foster (Nunhead) had taken the lead from Patrick Kibble (West Wickham), his yellow and white Evolution kart dominated. 3^rd was KPi’s Oliver Appleby (Colchester) from his team mate Josh King (Bexleyheath) who was right on his tail. In 5^th and 6^th were Freddy Simpson-Stacey (Guildford) and Ryan Taylor-Trueman(Southampton).

The Senior Rotax final was all about Elliot Rice (Thamesmead), the local circuit expert taking a commanding win over a quality field. Sam Baker (Sevenoaks) made a great start to hold Rice off briefly, but could not live with his pace on his way to second place, Johnathan Wilkes (Sittingbourne) threatened Baker early on only to settle for 3^rd place in the end. Shaun Hollingsworth (West Mersea) debuting his new kart finished 4^th from a good dice between Max Read (Maidstone) and Tom Skinner (Aylesford) who finished in that order.

The Junior Subarus were the last of the Kent Cup regulars to race. A great four way battle for first place was settled in the favour of Max Goodwin (Uckfield) whose clean and shiny kart crossed the line just ahead of Larbi Belkhit (Chislehurst), Christopher Bridle (Maidstone) and Jenson Harvey (Upminster). 5^th and 6^th were Warwick Daden (Hextable) and Dillan Hendry-Lewis (Orpington).

In the visiting classes, Levi King from Sevenoaks won the Senior X30, Alfie Brown (London) the Junior X30 class and in Formula Blue Chris Derrick (Chandlers Ford) was triumphant , the Junior Blue class won by Jake Calvert ( Barrow-In-Furness).

The next round of the Kent Cup is at Bayford Meadows Sittingbourne on July 26^th, while Buckmore Park shares its 4^th Summer Championship event with the Little Green Man series over the weekend of 18^th-19^th July. Entries are looking to be around the 200 mark, with qualifying heats taking place late on Saturday afternoon.