It was another great day’s racing at Bayford Meadows at the weekend.
Bayford Meadows Kart Club Summer Championships round 9.
A damp start to the day brought a lot of head scratching during the morning qualifying sessions, slicks, inters or full wets? Inevitably the wrong decision left one or two competitors at the wrong end of their grids, the weather lifted during late morning making decisions a lot easier to predict.
Ticehurst tops Bambinos.
Two of the six Bambino runners were running their new MSA National championship numbers for the first time and it was the number 6 of Blake Ticehurst that headed the merge after their three runs.
The last run featured and entertaining ‘dice’ between young Blake and Tighe Wratten, with the latter tucking his head into his steering wheel at every opportunity! It was Tighe who annexed the runner up spot from the new number 4 kart of Damian Barruss-Haggett. Eden Spanswick, Reg Heywood and Mikey Walker rounded out the top 6.
Brooks wins again in Clubman class.
Two drivers dominated the Honda Clubman final for round 9, Alfie Brooks and Jack Matthews spent the whole race with less than a second separating them. The KPi kart of Matthews wasn’t quite able to mount a challenge, so settled for a confidence boosting and well-deserved runner up spot.
For Brooks in his KC, GDC livered #57 kart, it was a continuation of a ‘Vardy’ like scoring run of Clubman wins that he is currently experiencing, so much so that his Dad and I were guessing what celebration he would do as he approached the finishing line! Some 6 seconds behind this pairing – Archie Walker took the final podium spot, driving a little too defensively early on according to his Dad, but delighting the RHP team. Jamie Perilly, Reece Lomax, Mika Renzullo and Declan Russell fought hard over the next positions finishing in that order. Alfie Brooks also took the fastest lap on his victorious way.
Cross wins for Ambition in Junior X30.
Ambition driver Finley Cross scored a popular victory in the Junior X30 class, having driven beautifully all day also winning both of the Pre finals along the way.
Bobby Grove brought the gap down to 3.3 seconds once past Ben Cowley to score a confidence boosting 2nd place after a recent run of bad luck. Cowley was just under 2 seconds back in third but well clear of a race long battle between Luke Shopland and Cameron Poynten, with only a tenth of a second between them at the finish. Cross recorded the race’s fastest lap on the 5th tour.
Rotherham seals Mini Max Championship with comfortable win.
Thomas Rotherham sealed the Mini Max championship with a commanding 6.3 second victory and fastest race lap, in doing so ending his Mini Max career in grand style before moving up into Juniors next month. He didn’t put a foot wrong all day, even managing a rare celebration for the cameraman as he crossed the finish line!
Behind the blue LICA kart was some fine early race action which went the way of a delighted Tom Lawson, his sinister black #34 machine pulling clear Benjamin Boras, Harvey Norton and Declan Lee, who had a topsy turvy final. Running close together in 6th and 7th were class debutant Sam Heading and Josh Wellard, two of the new breed that will no doubt be at the front of the pack next year.
Wall takes Max honours.
In the Senior Rotax class GMS driver Jack Wall hit good form after a patchy outing last month. His speed has never been in doubt and he proved that with a masterclass performance, apart from qualifying where he was a very close 2nd to circuit regular and LICA driver, Stephen Bouffe, perhaps the happiest man in the Bayford Meadows paddock on Sunday morning! Wall took honours in both Pre finals and comfortably by nearly 5 seconds in the final.
One man who had hopes of winning after last month’s excellent 2nd place was Lewis Ridd, his team were left slightly bewildered at his lack of expected pace in the final, where he finished 3rd behind G-Tech driver Rory Pye. This was to take nothing away from Pye though as he hunted down Ridd early on and held onto the flag in second place. Spencer Younger finished 4th making his way up from 8th on the grid in front of a driver making big improvements this month – Mike Ashby, he and his immaculately prepared G-Tech kart eventually found a way past Stephen Bouffe to finish in a smart 5th place. Bouffe took 6th from leading 177 driver Paul Williams and top novice Steve Thompson.
Beswick steals victory from Nash on the last lap in Junior Subaru.
The Junior Subaru class gave us another fantastic final this month, a brilliant advert for the very competitive class. An tense and exciting race long duel between Riley Stephenson and Troy Beswick became a threesome over the closing laps as Charlie Nash took full advantage of the two slowing each other up in their frenetic dice.
He then went one step further by snatching the lead on the last lap when the pair ahead made slight contact. It looked as though Nash had pulled off a perfectly opportunist win until the Subaru 12 wheeler rounded the mound, where somehow Beswick managed to grab the lead back and then hold on for the win.
It had been a champion’s drive by the GMS driver Beswick, Nash and Stephenson were both naturally disappointed to have lost the chance of a race win. Behind the battle for outright honours, Ross Connolly held off a queue of karts to take 4th, James Popple was 5th from Zac Spence in 6th. Stephenson’s race pace rewarded him with the fastest lap.
Herbert takes a classy Cadet win.
The Honda Cadet class last month saw two drivers battling to take their first win, with Max Herbert coming out on top from a race long dice with Theo Micouris.
For this month the race played out a different script as Micouris lead until the last lap, looking a though he was going to break his duck as the lead Virtus driver for the day, Herbert in his RHP kart had other ideas though and stealthily took the lead over the final tour to hold on for a Bayford Meadows double and fastest lap, also wrapping up the BMKC summer championship as he did so.
Micouris was glued to his bumper at the line to still take a fine 2nd place, behind in third was Ambition driver Owen Tolley, he managed to fend off a list of drivers including Callum Gunning who was classified 4th after finishing 5th on the road behind Evolution driver Kristian Brookes. Brookes was guilty of tapping the DNL kart of Gunning twice going into the Horseshoe section and retrospectively moved back to 5th. Mitchell Gibbons drove well to 6th in a very competitive field from Liam McNeilly, Zach Ripley, Jack’s Clements and Steadman rounding out the top 10.
Appleby holds off Ayres in Junior Max.
The last race of the day was a tense one for Oliver Appleby in the Junior Max class. His KPi kart set the early pace but on old tyres found himself to be a sitting duck over the final couple of laps, from the Project One kart of Henry Ayres.
With KPi boss Chris George frantically signalling Appleby to hurry up going into the last lap, he managed to just hold off the flying Ayres. Sean Berry had initially held down the runner up spot until Ayres found a way past and crossed the line in third 3 seconds behind but comfortably clear of Luke Freestone and Jake Kolosowski in 4th and 5th. Ayres took the fastest lap in his pursuit of Appleby.