Catch up on all the action in Q & R Sports & Racing at the Summer Festival thanks to Ian Buddery’s latest Category Manager Report.
With thanks to Ian Buddery
The HSRCA Summer Festival was an excellent event. The weather was beautiful, the racing great and the atmosphere relaxed and friendly – just as historic racing should be!
Q&R entries were lower than usual due in part to the clash with Sandown and unfortunately some late withdrawals, both health and business related. 12 cars made up the Q&R Sports and Racing grid.
Immediately before our first race, an MG jettisoned its oil on the line from entry to apex of turn 1, so the first few laps involved a cloud of white dust and uncertain grip. Tom Tweedie DNF’d with an engine misfire, after setting fastest lap, Chris Farrell took the flag.
The track was clean for our trophy race Sunday morning and I got a great start, getting down the inside of Chris and finding myself in the lead for the first time in my historic racing career. My grin was short lived though as I soon had Chris in my mirrors and a dice ensued. My rear tyres were fading and on lap 6 (or thereabouts) Chris got the better drive out of 15 and took a well-deserved lead, then the win. Meanwhile, Tom came from last to fourth.
Trophies were presented over lunch, with Ray Stubber winning the Ron Tauranac Trophy for Group Q Racing, presented by the great man himself. Tom Tweedie took home the Bib Stillwell Trophy for Group Q Sports, Chris Farrell first place trophies for both Group QR and Group R, yours truly for second and Vivian King for third. Smiles all round!
The final race wasn’t so great for me, my rear tyres fell away completely and I nearly lost it coming onto the main straight on lap 1, which obliged me to back off, then I had the ignominy of running out of fuel on lap 9, while Chris, Vivian and Peter Warren made up the podium.
I’d like to compliment all Q&R drivers for an incident free weekend with good sportsmanship on display throughout.
Meanwhile at Sandown (looking at Natsoft results) John Bowe in the March 741 dominated a ten-car field, from Andrew Makin (March 73B) and Donald Hume (Ralt RT4) with David Hardman (Hardman JH-1) in 3rd for race 2, Jamie Larner (Ralt RT1) 3rd in race 3. Jonathan Miles (Tiga S2000) was the best S2000 in races 1 and 2, with Grant Kelly (Tiga SC-82) winning the category in race 3, where it appears Jonathan was a DNS.
Please note that I would greatly appreciate receiving reports and anecdotes from any competitors at other events, not matter how brief. Email details below.
Over the course of the last month I’ve spoken to many Q&R drivers and I’d like to thank everyone for their support. I’m slowly getting the hang of the category manager job and I’ll do my best to serve the interests of our group and the sport in general. Please email me with any news I’ve missed or any topic you’d like to raise: qr@hsrca.com
Ian Buddery
