The first round of the South Eastern based Formula 6 four stroke Karting Championships took place on Saturday 4th April at the Camberley Kart Club circuit Blackbushe in Surrey.
This first event was classed as an ‘away’ round for the mostly Kent based Championship, whose roots sprung in the mid-seventies when the Rochester Motor Club (which itself recently celebrated its’ centenary year) set up this four stroke Go-kart powered series.
It is MSA sanctioned and still very much a grass roots form of karting. F6 past winners include current international Formula E driver Sam Bird and World Karting champions Ben Cooper and Sean Babington.
Dwindling entries to the once booming Championship has done nothing to dampen the enthusiasm and spirit of the competitors, who spend a considerable amount of their own time in preparing their race machines, without the help of the big teams associated with the more affable two stroke karting.
Four classes of karts were represented on Saturday and the first of these was for the Honda Cadets.
Two drivers had dominated the three qualifying heats, with Harry Arthur taking two wins and Dylan Brierley enthusiastically one. Come the final it was these two that set off in a race of their own, Dylan pushing Harry every inch of the way waiting for any mistake that may happen.
Unfortunately for young Dylan the mistake never occurred and even scoring the fastest lap didn’t help, Harry still romped home to a first win in the series, although it was only by a scant 0.363 of a second. Behind them Jacob Cooper took home a nice trophy for being the only finisher in his class, although many saw it as a just reward for this young novice driver who improved in leaps and bounds during the day.
The second final was for the Pro kart heavy drivers, this class has been the main stay of four stroke karting for many years, with the twin engine machines providing former World Touring Car champion and now works Lada driver – Rob Huff with his starting point into karting and motorsport in general. Saturday’s final for the class saw Trevor Bull beat Steve Turner comfortably to win; Trevor was almost embarrassed by his ease of victory and will surely be hoping for closer competition for round two. 
The third final provided us with one of the best races that you will witness anywhere! The modified twin engine Pro Karts are much faster than their standard cousins. The engines are tuned by the drivers themselves, some of whom import parts from all over the world to enable them to be that tenth of a second quicker than their opponents. The comradery amongst these gentlemen drivers is almost legendary in the F6 paddock but racing on the track can be and usually is fierce.
The fastest three drivers on the day were Nigel Cordrey, Tony Whitehead and last year’s champion Graham King. These three fought tooth and nail on the qualifying heats and come the final it was Chatham’s Cordrey who held the initial lead, with Whitehead, King, Barry Lambert and Lee Mitchell hanging on behind. The latter of these five Mitchell, clouted the chicane tyre barrier at mid-distance and dropped away from the furious dice ahead. Whitehead seized his chance of snatching the lead away from Cordrey near the end only to run a little wide at the twisty ‘complex’ part of the short 30 second lap, this gave King a chance to pounce and he was through into second place. After 31 laps of the fast picturesque Surrey bowl it was Cordrey who just held on to win, it was close though as the top four were covered by just over half a second at the finish!
King held the recovering Whitehead back to take second, with Lambert watching all the action from close behind in fourth. Mitchell shook his head in disgust after his mistake to hold off Roberto Nardone, who had travelled all the way up from South Wales to compete, rounding out the top six.
The last final of the day was left for the fastest and most powerful karts to entertain and that they did. The heats had witnessed one or two contentious issues arise, through these though it was Dave Anker who put his kart on the pole slot. He led away from Christopher Day, Johnathon Carberry and the chasing pack, amongst these was one of the pre event favourites, Rochester’s Thomas Lyndhurst, he was starting fifth due to being penalised one lap in one of the heats for slipping through a chicane.
Lyndhurst was on fire as he came through and was soon pressing Anker hard for the lead. Contact had been made in the heats between these two, so it was no shock when they rubbed wheels going across the start/finish line at half distance; neither wanting to give way. Lyndhurst had the inside line for the first corner however and took the lead, Anker retaliated three corners later but made an error of judgement and slipped back leaving him agonisingly 0.46s short at the finish of the race.
Christopher Day took a comfortable third although a long way back, from Carberry and Jason Cooper.
The second round returns to Kent at the Bayford Meadows circuit at Sittingbourne on May 2nd.