A healthy 21 car entry arrived
at Mallory Park for round three of the Championship, full of aspirations but
mindful of the impending weather forecast. Unfortunately the weather turned
severely and with standing water on the track, the race was cancelled.
Defending Champion Peter
Harper had qualified his Mallock on pole. “It was very difficult, but the car
felt good and my only problem was traction out of the Hairpin,” he explained.
But Harper’s time was 2.839secs quicker than Mark Charteris, who was closely
followed by Anthony Denham’s Doris and Steve Campbell’s Raffo. “I started to
feel my way around and was just getting a wiggle on when the session was red
flagged,” said Denham. For Campbell his seasonal debut was all over anyway, “the
engine just blew with no warning,” he said.
Mike Hickson’s Mallock was
fifth best, “that was very slippery, I am happy but I didn’t exploit a clear lap
I had,” he said. Completing the third row was a disappointed Malcolm Jackson, “I
was looking for a clearing lap, not good,” he said. Steve Chaplin was more than
happy with his seventh placed Phantom however, “it felt lovely and I absolutely
loved it,” he reckoned.
Gavin Childs was also pleased
with his Gryphon, “it’s the first time we’d tried a real wet set up on the car.
It was quite driveable and I enjoyed it,” he concluded.
Barry Webb’s Mallock led the
class B qualifiers. “It would have been fun if we had our full time and people
didn’t go so slowly. Oh I had to hold it in top gear too, so did Gerards one
handed,” he explained. Clive Wood was fractionally behind, “just wanting to keep
it on the Island.” Keith Whyman class A car was next quickest, before Dave Facer
and Ian Mitchell’s class B’s. “I struggled at the Hairpin but didn’t brake for
Gerards,” said Facer.
Ewan Bason made a rare
appearance in the Myers Special, while Sam Lancaster’s class A car just edged
out Jared Wood’s Class D Batten. Jeremy Banks’ class B Mallock was next up,
while John Deane-Bowers survived a spin at Devils Elbow, Reg Powell’s Gryphon
had misfiring gremlins, Ashley Seymour’s debut brought out the reds after
spinning the Tasman at the Esses and Bob Yarwood brought up the rear.
Following accidents in earlier
races, the drivers got together and the majority voted not to race. “I went out
around the track with the Clerk of the Course and the Stewards. At first I
thought it was Ok, but there was a lot of standing water and by the time we had
decided not to race, the stewards had decided to cancel,” said Mike Hickson.
“I would have raced and Peter
Harper too, but we don’t want people hurt and we have another round soon,” said
Mark Charteris. But Malcolm Jackson and Ian Mitchell had both loaded their
trailers before the decision was made.
Issued by
Peter Scherer for the Clubmans Register April 10th 2007. Contact
01332 362577/07802 853244 or
peter@scher.freeserve.co.uk